Something horrible is happening in France right now. Several coordinated terror attacks seem to be under way. France is restricting domestic travel and closing the country’s borders:
Police officials in France on Friday reported a shootout in a Paris restaurant, a nearby music hall, and an explosion in a bar near a Paris stadium. At least 26 people have been killed, police say. An AP source says at least 35 are dead and 100 are being held hostage.
French President Francois Hollande has ordered France’s borders closed in response to the attacks.
“We don’t know where this menace is coming from, but they are terrorists.” Hollande said and that “any means necessary” will be used to neutralize terrorists.
Let’s share links and information in this thread. To my French readers, je suis désolée. What a horrible tragedy.
Clarissa's Blog 
The most recent information puts the number of casualties at over 60 http://www.thewrap.com/paris-terror-attacks-in-multiple-locations-leave-at-least-18-dead/
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President Barack Obama on Friday decried the attacks around Paris that left dozens dead, stressing that the United States is “prepared and ready” to provide assistance to France.
“This is an attack not just on Paris. It’s an attack not just on the people of France. But this is an attack on all of humanity and the universal values we share,” he said.
http://www.cnbc.com/2015/11/13/obama-france-attack-is-on-all-of-humanity-and-universal-values-we-share.html
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This will sound horrible but I’m glad this didn’t happen here because that would be the end of President Hillary.
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This incident could be a game-changer, anyway. Obama may be forced to realize that the U.S. has to take a leadership role, and he can’t just let ISIS simmer on the back burner until after the 2016 election.
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Agreed. And Hillary must be EXTREMELY hawkish or the election will be lost for her. She is more hawkish naturally than Obama, so she will probably be ok. This is game, set, match for Bernie. Time for the adults to be at the table (I know harsh, but I don’t think anyone thinks he has the military chops / aggressiveness for this world).
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I agree, Bernie has neither the knowledge nor the interest in foreign affairs. Unless it’s about class inequality in the US, he can’t muster any enthusiasm for it.
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Bernie, despite his good qualities, has never realized that some people (and countries) have different values than he does.
He thinks wer’e all New England upper middle class liberals under the skin.
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It’s great to see somebody so optimistic and hopeful at your age. 🙂 I’m more jaded so I don’t believe Obama will develop an interest in foreign affairs now or ever.
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And it’s nice to see somebody so cynical and realistic at your age. 🙂 You’re a fast learner.
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Hey, I was born in the USSR. We know always to expect the worst.
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I’m actually starting to think that part of the legacy of East European communism (away from Russian speaking places at least) is positive. There’s a kind of survival instinct that western Europe seems to have largely lost.
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You are absolutely right. I’m actually happy I was born in the USSR, in spite of all the shit that brought me.
I have an enormous blogroll, hundreds of sources that belong to all sorts of people of all political persuasions. And I’ve noticed that each culture’s blogosphere has its own mood, its own modality, so to speak. The American blogosphere is always flaccidly apocalyptic. The Ukrainian blogosphere is always joyful. This was especially striking when war was going on in Ukraine. Of course, a lot of bad stuff was happening but the voices were robust, confident, and direct. It’s precisely a survival instinct, as you say, where people want to live because they know they have value, they have something crucial to give to the world.
And then I see English-speaking writers of all political stripes working so hard to convince themselves that the end is near that I begin to wonder if they want it to be near.
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And it is a great day for the Front national…
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“And it is a great day for the Front national…”
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2nd worst terrorists attack since 9/11 (madrid maybe being worse). Europe will be officially closed withing the month. Right or wrong. It is going to happen
Real question is will this lead to boots on the ground in syria? Not willing to endorse that yet, but yeah, the world just changed a good bit tonight.
Hopefully rational, non-xenophoic, yet swift responses are meted.
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I feel horrible for France. Just this year they had Charlie Hebdo, the failed terror attack on the train, the headless body in Lyons, and now this. It sucks so much for them
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Yeah i am with you. I do feel horrible. And as you know they have a very very large marginalized muslim population. Not to mention all the new immigrants. Obviously most are peaceful, but basic math here.
Million immigrants. Even if 0.1% are terrorists, that is 1,000 terrorists. Likely 10-25 did all the damage tonight. Borders could close to middle east.. almost certainly for a few months, perhaps years etc. Don’t want to exaggerate but this has the feel of a tipping point
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Abhorrent and incomprehensible.
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City official says around 100 people killed in Bataclan concert hall in Paris.
And 40 others dead in other locations.
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Horrifying. How is this even possible.
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Ukrainian media report that one of the terrorists has been captured and has identified himself as being allied with Islamic State.
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Good source for keeping up with events.
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This is from Radio Télévision Suisse (formerly Télévision Suisse Romande), including a timeline that’s being updated at this time:
Radio Télévision Suisse —
“Les attaques à Paris ont fait près de 120 morts, état d’urgence en France”:
http://www.rts.ch/info/7252073-les-attaques-a-paris-ont-fait-pres-de-120-morts-etat-d-urgence-en-france.html
“Près de 120 personnes ont perdu la vie dans la nuit de vendredi à samedi à Paris dans une série d’attaques contre la capitale, selon un dernier bilan de sources policières. Le bilan le plus lourd concerne la prise d’otages au Bataclan, durant laquelle cent personnes ont été tuées. François Hollande a décrété l’état d’urgence après ces attentats ainsi que la fermeture des frontières.”
There are maps and pictures for those who want to see the full series of events.
[BTW, I’m providing a Swiss source because I’ve learned through experience that if I want accurate reportage, it’s best not to trust too heavily the media within a country because they’re often susceptible to the usual “self-censoring” tactics described by Orwell …]
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French diplomatic services has provided this information from French Président François Hollande that includes an 0800 number for those affected:
France Diplomatie —
“Déclaration du Président de la République suite aux attentats (13 novembre 2015)”:
http://www.diplomatie.gouv.fr/fr/le-ministere-et-son-reseau/evenements-et-actualites-du-ministere/article/declaration-du-president-de-la-republique-suite-aux-attentats-13-11-15
“… le Président de la République a décidé le rétablissement immédiat des contrôles aux frontières. Les services des douanes sont également mobilisés à cet effet.”
Hollande is also staying in Paris and is sending the MFA to G20 instead.
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Ukrainians are now saying there are 140 dead. Exaggerating?
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Some Sky News reports say “153” dead, and some news sources say there may still be undiscovered bodies in the concert building. The final toll won’t be known for a while.
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The French seem to be saying that they’ve been thwarting terror plots almost daily in the past year. What I don’t get is why is it so often France.
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Not my area of expertise, but I think three main reasons:
1.Largest muslim population in western europe
Most brutal colonial ties to the muslim world – much animosity and fodder for terrorists to leverage
Little integration into mainstream society. From what I have read, this is both the choice of the immigrants as well as the choice of main stream french population to not integrate. Few economic opportunities.
So big population of disaffected 15-30 year old males, with no future, feeling humiliated, with lots of propaganda… is a powder keg recipe
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As of 0845 Paris time (2345 Los Angeles time for me), RTSInfo was still stating 120 with a listing of specifics, although other sources are reporting numbers as high as 150 …
RTSInfo:
“Au moins 120 personnes ont été tuées et 200 autres blessées, dont 80 grièvement, vendredi soir à Paris lors d’une série d’attaques terroristes en six endroits différents de la capitale. La fusillade la plus meurtrière s’est déroulée dans la salle de concert du Bataclan, où au moins 82 personnes ont perdu la vie au terme d’une prise d’otages. D’autres fusillades ont eu lieu dans plusieurs rues parisiennes et des explosions ont retenti au Stade de France durant une match amical de l’équipe de France.”
More live tickers and feeds from various sources:
Le Soir (BE):
http://live.lesoir.be/Event/Fusillade_a_Paris_2
ARD Tagesschau (DE):
https://www.tagesschau.de/anschlaege-paris-111.html
Svenska Dagbladet (SE):
http://www.svd.se/skjutning-i-centrala-paris–flera-dodsfall/om/terrordaden-i-paris
(with plenty of pictures, hope you have bandwidth)
Élysée Twitter (FR):
The 0800 number can also be found on the Élysée Twitter feed.
The state of affairs several hours ago in a sign, courtesy of the Mayor of Paris:
“MAIRIE DE PARIS 00:17 … FUSILLADES PARIS … Nous vous invitons a rester chez vous en attendant les instructions des autorites + infos sur PARIS.FR …”
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Even the Vatican is sounding an appropriately belligerent tone now.
Statement released by the Director of Pope Francis’ Press Office in response to the attacks in Paris:
“Here in the Vatican we are following the terrible news from Paris. We are shocked by this new manifestation of maddening, terrorist violence and hatred which we condemn in the most radical way together with the Pope and all those who love peace. We pray for the victims and the wounded, and for all the French people. This is an attack on peace for all humanity, and it requires a decisive, supportive response on the part of all of us as we counter the spread the homicidal hatred in all of its forms.”
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The refugees are fucked, no matter who did this.
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What can the refugees possibly have to do with this?? France hasn’t been accepting any.
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“What can the refugees possibly have to do with this?? France hasn’t been accepting any.”
Well, that would be the rational way to think but I see right-wingers getting some political mileage out of this one. Reader matt here, for example, is already fantasizing about closing the borders.
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I’m hearing that these acts of terror are already being used to promote an anti- gun control message.
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Ted Cruz has already come out and said we need to kill more civilians.
“Radical Islam … will not be deterred by targeted airstrikes with zero tolerance for civilian casualties..”
Untargeted airstrikes is the answer, folks!
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Let’s make Putin happy and elect this fellow. They will have so much in common.
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Maybe not now, but they did accept a lot in the past and did not properly integrate them. The point being, accepting millions of people and not integrating them is a ticking time bomb. The current refugee crisis is unsustainable and will lead to problems such as France is experiencing right now.
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\ Maybe not now, but they did accept a lot in the past and did not properly integrate them. The point being, accepting millions of people and not integrating them is a ticking time bomb. The current refugee crisis is unsustainable and will lead to problems such as France is experiencing right now.
+100
Attackers appeared to be French-born
Hnery Samuel, our France correspondent, reports that the first two victims who turned up to the Hôtel-Dieu hospital in central Paris told doctors and counsellors the attackers appeared to be young French-born.
They said that the gunmen in the Bataclan shouted to the crowd: “Allahu Akbar. We’re stronger than the French”.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/europe/france/11995541/Paris-shootings-terrorist-attack-french-victims-latest-news.html
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from the business time:
France has not accepted as many Syrian refugees as other European countries. Only about 20,000 Syrians over the last several years have entered France, according to the United Nations.
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Yes, this is why I’m saying that refugees have nothing to do with this. The attacks were well-coordinated, planned, thought out. How can a bunch of refugees come up with the expertise, the resources, and the knowledge of the country to pull this off?
Or is it that people refer as “refugees” to the grandchildren of the 1960 immigrants?
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This is brave: PorteOuverte
website
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If any escaped terrorist butchers need a hiding place, they should just follow the yellow brick road into the arms of collaborative French idiots . Their extermination will solve the problem.
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These look like very coordinated, well-planned acts. I’m sure that if these weren’t intended as suicide acts, escape plans were made.
It seems like the terrorists were not trying to survive, though.
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There’s also #strandedintheUS and #strandedinCanada.
As always, the signal to noise ratio is high.
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https://twitter.com/JessicaValenti/status/665335810133131264
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I feel terrible for the innocent victims. My takeaway is that any success against ISIS in the countries formerly known as Syria and Iraq will be followed in short order by terrorist attacks (mostly in the west though just the other day a setback was followed by bombs in Lebanon).
The question is weither liquidy post nation-state people in the west will put up with that until the rats are exterminated or just opt to wash their hands of the whole affair and want to let ISIS alone.
And bye-bye Schengen, you were fun while you lasted, it was never compatible with real diversity (which is not some never-ending street fair but a never-ending low grade hostilities between groups).
And thanks Neocons (officially the worst people ever) for you plan called : Let’s destabilize everything between Morocco and Pakistan! Only good things will happen!
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The theory goes is that in the midst of ever more frequent and deadly terror attacks the new state form has to prove whether it’s viable by offering citizens security from terror. I’m waiting for proof.
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I think it’ll be a long wait…
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\ The theory goes is that in the midst of ever more frequent and deadly terror attacks the new state form has to prove whether it’s viable by offering citizens security from terror. I’m waiting for proof.
Yesterday, I missed who answered questions on BBC (?), but the person said French terror specialists have known about the situation for ages and predict yesterday’s events to be the future of Europe in the next decades.
How can offering security from terror go together with porous borders and letting the whole world’s criminals into one’s country? If every criminal may enter, why not every terrorist?
For instance, this entire article is very interesting:
“Refugee Children” Invade Sweden
…
Unaccompanied refugee children are the next billion-dollar industry in Sweden. With an average cost of 2000 kronor ($233) per child per day, the 7000 refugee “children” who came last year cost 5.1 billion kronor ($595 million).
…
In 2013, Wager wrote on her blog that as many as 86% of those who come to Sweden claiming to be children may be adults.
…
A relatively new situation is of children — genuine underage children — from Morocco. But as Morocco is not at war, the children have no grounds for asylum. […] They are usually street children from Tangiers or Casablanca, who started doing drugs at an early age, and they distrust all authorities. […] The Moroccan boys commit crimes such as theft, petty larceny, pickpocketing and muggings, but the authorities do not know how to handle the kids who decline the help offered by the Swedish state.
http://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/6190/sweden-refugee-children
Another article about Germany:
Police Official: ‘Forget About’ Deporting Criminal Migrants
http://www.germanimmigration.eu/2015/11/a-while-ago-on-my-other-blog-we-met-hamza-a-washington-post-reporter-who-spoke-fluent-arabic-encountered-hamza-and-his-frie.html
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\ the person said French terror specialists have known about the situation for ages and predict yesterday’s events to be the future of Europe in the next decades.
Clarification: French terror specialists predict that, not the interviewed person. (According to the interviewed person).
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Remember the tale of the Pied Piper, who freed a village under attack by vicious rats, and then immediately afterward took away the villages’s innocents (their children)? A thorough cleansing of the terrorist rats now in Europe and in the Israeli-Palestinian Middle East could wash those nation-states clean and bring in decades of peace) ala’ the forced decades of peace in Western Europe after 1945, after many wartime rats were driven into the sea along with a regretful number of collateral-damage innocents.
But what national leaders today will join together to direct the band, and at what ultimate price?
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Dreidel, be careful with what you wish for. Because the immediate answer to your question is “Putin”. Are you prepared that the leaders who have guts for something like that (I am not judging if it is good or bad at the moment, for the sake of simplicity, but it requires guts.) will not give a rat’s ass about so called US leadership position?
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Effective U.S. leadership to crush ISIS would require a substantial U.S. boots-on-the-ground military force going into direct combat, with significant troop contributions by allied NATO forces. Obviously, Putin can’t be allowed to control any coalition.
This slaughter in Paris by itself probably isn’t sufficient to force Obama’s hand, or to tip American opinion into supporting such action — but if ISIS keeps attacking Europe directly, public opinion will change.
Liberal Democratic Senator Diane Feinstein (certainly no right winger) has said for months, “We’re going to have ISIS now, or we’re going to have to fight ISIS later.” Now she is specifically calling for a much more robust U.S. action than the 50 special forces that Obama has recently sent into the area.
Hollande has said, “We are at war,” and France is sending an aircraft carrier toward the combat area, presumably to increase aerial attacks on ISIS.
Where all of this goes from here remains to be seen.
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Putin has thousands of soldiers to contribute who are desperate to leave Donbass for Syria. He might offer them up in return for sanctions being lifted. That’s what I fear.
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Well, we shouldn’t take his offer. The U.S. and NATO have sufficient military force to destroy ISIS without Russian help.
But some of the European NATO countries who do business with Russia would like an excuse to lift the sanctions, anyway, so you’re right to be concerned.
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Precisely! Putin couldn’t defeat the non-existent Ukrainian army. He’ll do no damage to the serious fellows of Daesh.
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\ Putin has thousands of soldiers to contribute who are desperate to leave Donbass for Syria.
Why would those soldiers think fighting ISIS will be less dangerous?
\ He might offer them up in return for sanctions being lifted. That’s what I fear.
But, if those soldiers leave Donbass, won’t Ukraine’s situation improve?
Couldn’t one talk to Putin and make the offer “send soldiers to Syria, leave Donbass in peace and we lift sanctions”? He doesn’t really want Donbass, and switching Russian attention to Syria would let Putin quietly forget about Donbass without a loss of face. (Unless Putin thinks continuing with Donbass is his best choice despite potential lifting of sanctions.)
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Yes, absolutely, Ukraine wants to get rid of these fellows. But not in exchange for Putin getting exactly what he wanted from the start with his invasion of Ukraine: a recognition as a major player on the world arena and an equal to the US. Let’s remember that Putin and his people can’t be voted out of office. Encouraging them today will free them up to keep invading people tomorrow. If they see that there is no price to pay for invasions, why will they stop?
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Paris attacks: Why has France been targeted again?
The Paris attacks, killing around 140 people, have outraged the world. But, sadly, they will not have surprised the French authorities, who are well aware of the threats to their nation
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/europe/france/11995505/Paris-attacks-Why-has-France-been-targeted-again.html
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There are good posts in Russian lj too:
Теракты в Париже. Соболезнуем. И включаем мозги
http://taki-net.livejournal.com/2218545.html
Another Russian blogger wrote about the danger of gun-free zones, which I can’t agree with. In Israel, nobody will let an armed person into theatre or a concert hall either. I think not even if s/he is an IDF soldier in uniform.
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“Another Russian blogger wrote about the danger of gun-free zones, which I can’t agree with.”
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A co-founder of the Free Gaza movement, Mary Hughes-Thompson, raised the possibility that Israel was behind the deadly attacks that hit Paris on Friday night and killed 120 people.
“I haven’t accused Israel of involvement. Still, Bibi [Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu] is upset about the European settlement boycott. So who knows,” Hughes-Thompson tweeted following the attacks on Saturday morning.
http://www.jpost.com/Israel-News/Palestinian-rights-activist-raises-possibility-Israel-behind-Paris-attacks-433010
From wiki: “The Free Gaza Movement is a coalition of human rights activists and pro-Palestinian groups formed to challenge the Israeli-Egyptian blockade imposed on the Gaza Strip by sailing humanitarian aid ships to Gaza. The group has more than 70 endorsers, including Desmond Tutu and Noam Chomsky.”
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With champions like Tutu and Chomsky, nobody other than the extreme left is going to take “Free Gaza” very seriously. Desmond Tutu is a very old man (84) who is confusing the genuine apartheid history of his own country, South Africa, with the false equivalence of Israel’s struggle against terror.
Noam Chomsky is a equally elderly discredited linguist who has spent his entire career, when he wasn’t misinterpreting language studies, being a “blame-America-firster” from the earliest days of the Cold War through 9/11 and beyond. He sees Israel as the U.S.’s “Mimi-Me,” and thus applies the same standards.
The “Free Gaza” movement has tried to run the legal (even by U.N. standards) military blockage of Gaza several times in recent years, and the movement is always careful to put fragile old people (like great-grandmothers) on its ships so that it can claim that the Israelis are attacking defenseless senile do-gooders when Israeli sailors exercise their legitimate right to stop the blockage-running ships (which are carrying material that could be used for legitimate construction but invariably is diverted into construction of war material and tunnels).
Some people never learn.
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“A co-founder of the Free Gaza movement, Mary Hughes-Thompson, raised the possibility that Israel was behind the deadly attacks that hit Paris on Friday night and killed 120 people.”
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Islamic State claims responsibility for attack in Paris
Isil has said in a statement, written in French and Arabic, and an audo message claiming responsibility for the attacks, and warning it is the “first of a storm”.
They say that France will remain a top target as long as it continues its policies, and the attacks were a response to insults of Islam’s prophet and airstrikes in Isil territory.
The statement says that the attackers were “targeting the capital of prostitution and obscenity, the carrier of the banner of the Cross in Europe, Paris”.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/europe/france/11995541/Paris-shootings-terrorist-attack-french-victims-latest-news.html
By “the carrier of the banner of the Cross in Europe,” do they refer to Christian religion? How can it be both “the capital of prostitution” and of Christianity?
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“By “the carrier of the banner of the Cross in Europe,” do they refer to Christian religion? How can it be both “the capital of prostitution” and of Christianity?”
But it’s curious how their vision of Paris is very 19th-century European. I’m guessing some of their members went to school in Europe but snoozed through the last couple of grades.
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interesting tweet:
Dan Holloway @RFCdan
To people blaming refugees for attacks in Paris tonight. Do you not realise these are the people the refugees are trying to run away from..?
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An interesting article from New Yorker – the reporter went to the suburbs and talked with people (before yesterday’s attacks):
Life in the Paris Banlieues
http://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2015/08/31/the-other-france
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BREAKING: Second suspected Paris attacker very likely to have passed through Greece: Greek government source
Earlier, a Greek government minister said the holder of a Syrian passport found near the body of one of the gunmen who died in the attacks in Paris had passed through the Greek island of Leros in October.
“It is very likely that a second suspect also passed through Greece. The investigation is continuing,” one of the sources said.
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