Month: February 2021

Israel is the only democracy in the world to prohibit its citizens from returning home during the pandemic, the Israel Democracy Institute (IDI) said, urging authorities to relax an entry ban that, it says, violates human rights. All entry points into Israel by land, sea and air remain shut tight since January 25 as part of the Benjamin Netanyahu government’s measures to prevent the new coronavirus variants from getting into the country. No one may come or go, except the few who have received a special permission from the Exceptions Committee. The harsh restrictions that resulted in thousands of Israelis being stranded abroad are “extremely problematic from a constitutional perspective and are without parallel in the democratic world,” IDI experts said, in a paper submitted to Israel’s Deputy Attorney General, Raz Nizri, on Sunday. Australia, France, Germany, UK, Russia, the US and other nations have tried different approaches in tackling the virus, but all of them have allowed…

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Authorities in the German capital have announced a ban on the radical Islamist group Jama’atu Berlin following a series of dawn raids. Berlin’s Senate has announced on Twitter that it has banned the “jihadist-Salafist association Jama’atu Berlin,” also known as Tauhid Berlin. The tweet Thursday said police in Berlin and Brandenburg had carried out early-morning searches of properties belonging to the group’s members.

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On February 23, 2021, China’s Global Times published an editorial entitled “Five Eyes Today’s Axis of White Supremacy” which condemned the new anti-Chinese attacks by the members of the Intelligence apparatus which has accelerated in recent weeks. The editorial began by condemning the Canadian government’s recent decision to unanimously condemn China as a sponsor of genocide during the embarrassing 266-0 vote on February 21, and then said: “Canada, the UK and Australia, three members of the Five Eyes alliance, have recently taken action to put pressure on China. They have formed a US-centered, racist, and mafia-styled community, willfully and arrogantly provoking China and trying to consolidate their hegemony as all gangsters do.” While major mainstream press covering this editorial decried China Times’s accusations as conspiratorial and foolish, it is worth asking if there is merit and truth underlying the condemnation? For those who may not be aware, the Five Eyes is the name…

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In the aftermath of the Jan. 6 Capitol riot, Former Sergeant at Arms Paul Irving recalled to House Admin how previous discussions with House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and her office factored in to his “blender of decision making,” according to three sources with direct knowledge of Irving’s talk with House Admin. Pelosi’s office had previously impressed upon Irving that the National Guard was to remain off Capitol Grounds, Irving allegedly told House Admin. The discussions, which centered around “optics,” allegedly occurred in the months prior to the Jan. 6 riot, during a time when deployment of federal resources for civil unrest was unpopular with Democrats and many members of Congress. The three sources who confirmed the discussion to the Daily Caller did so under the condition of anonymity, citing the fear of putting a chill on further witnesses to how the security situation unfolded Jan. 6. The discussion, if accurate, raises questions as to what role Pelosi’s office had in the…

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Donald Trump Jr. says it is working class Americans, those earning the least in the economy, who will be forced to foot the bill for President Joe Biden’s mass immigration agenda. In an exclusive interview with Breitbart News’s Washington Political Editor Matt Boyle, Trump Jr. said that President Trump “had it right” on immigration when he sought to reduce overall immigration levels to tighten the United States labor market and drive up wages. Biden, in contrast, is flooding the U.S. labor market with cheap, often illegal, foreign labor that will have a disparate impact on the nation’s working poor and working class — those at the bottom end of the labor market. “The plans that Joe Biden is putting forth, it’s creating a flood into this country. What is that going to do to the lowest income earners? When you have a flood of illegals coming in here, who’s going to pay for all of their free health insurance and all the other freebies that the Biden administration wants to give them?…

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Unless you read the local Venezuelan press, you are unlikely to know that an American secret agent is currently standing trial in Venezuela on charges of terrorism and weapons trafficking. Matthew John Heath was arrested in September outside Amuay and Cardon oil refineries in possession of a submachine gun, a grenade launcher, C4 explosives, a satellite phone and bricks of $20 bills. The Venezuelan government also alleges that he was found carrying a small coin or badge that CIA employees use to prove their identity to one another without raising suspicions. On Wednesday, Heath pled not guilty to all charges. Situated in Falcon state in the west of the country, the Amuay and Cardon facilities are the largest refineries in the oil-rich nation, considered an enemy of the United States since it elected socialist president Hugo Chavez in 1998. The facilities have been the site of controversy before: in 2012, a fire at the plants killed 55 people; after conducting hundreds of interviews…

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As Trump-era policies protecting America’s borders have been undone by the new administration, illegal immigrants are being held in facilities illegally. White House press secretary Jen Psaki claimed these laws are really more like guidelines. “The objective is to move kids, unaccompanied minors as quickly as possible under 72 hours to these HHS fund sponsored facilities, which is the one where we’ve been referring to in Texas. Some, unfortunately, did stay four days, five days or longer, but the objective is to move them as quickly as possible to the HHS sponsored facilities.” Psaki added the options for non-citizens seeking asylum were slim to none. “We can quickly transfer them from CBP to these HHS run facilities. That’s one option, or we can put them with families and sponsors without any vetting.” Authorities detained roughly 6,000 children last month, and they project 9,000 more arrests in February.

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The US space agency has renamed its DC headquarters after NASA’s first black female engineer Mary Jackson, celebrating with a poem about “going to Mars” even as the agency delayed a planned return to the Moon. Long merely called ‘NASA Headquarters’, the Washington, DC building was officially renamed in honor of Jackson on Friday. She became the space agency’s first black female engineer in 1958, seven years after joining its predecessor, the National Advisory Committee for Aeronautics (NACA).

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Michigan Republican state legislators are calling for an investigation into Gov. Gretchen Whitmer over coronavirus deaths at nursing homes and other long-term care facilities. The legislatures have sent a formal letter to U.S. Attorney General Monty Wilkinson and Michigan Attorney General Dana Nessel requesting an investigation. Fox News reports that State Sen. Jim Runestad spearheaded the letters, which were signed by seven other Republican state senators. “Gov. Whitmer’s regional hub policy placed patients with and without COVID-19 in the same facilities and may have exacerbated the death toll in those facilities. Questions remain regarding the accuracy of data, compliance with CDC guidelines and compliance with our state’s Freedom of Information Act. There is a critical need for a full investigation into these matters.” The senators also pointed to “discrepancies” in cases and death data “in the state’s long-term care facilities.” The letter continued:

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A US District Judge in San Jose, California says she was “disturbed” over Google’s data collection practices, after learning that the company still collects and uses data from users in its Chrome browser’s so-called ‘incognito’ mode – and has demanded an explanation “about what exactly Google does,” according to Bloomberg. In a class-action lawsuit that describes the company’s private browsing claims as a “ruse” – and “seeks $5,000 in damages for each of the millions of people whose privacy has been compromised since June of 2016,” US District Judge Lucy Koh said she finds it “unusual” that the company would make the “extra effort” to gather user data if it doesn’t actually use the information for targeted advertising or to build user profiles.

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