While Russia strives to move Syria on from a stage of war and bloody anarchy to one of peace, stability and reconstruction — by inviting all parties to next month’s Sochi conference to agree a roadmap including a new constitution and presidential and parliamentary elections – the US and Israel are drawing up plans to detonate the region and plunge it into new wars on the pretext of confronting the Iranian threat.

I was asked by a reader on the Darkmoon site to run an article on Monika Shaeffer, the Canadian Holocaust revisionist famous for her controversial video, “Sorry Mom, I was wrong about the Holocaust.” Until recently, like everyone else I know, I had no idea that Monika Schaefer had fallen into deep trouble.

A series of emails suddenly began entering my inbox last week, giving me the shocking news that Monika Schaefer, on a Christmas visit from Canada to Germany, the country of her ancestors, had suddenly been arrested in a courthouse in Munich. Here she had gone to attend the trial of Sylvia Stolz for alleged Holocaust denial, one of several other well-behaved citizens, sitting there quietly and not expecting any trouble.

More than 100 actors, musicians, writers and directors have signed a pledge of support of New Zealand pop singer Lorde after she was criticized for cancelling a concert in Israel.
The pledge, which was published as an open letter in the Guardian on Friday, was signed by well-known artists including Mark Ruffalo, Peter Gabriel, Roger Waters, Viggo Mortensen, Tom Morello, John Cusack, Julie Christie, Shepard Fairey, Eve Ensler, Angela Davis, Talib Kweli, and James Schamus, WAFA reported.

Lorde has been making headlines since canceling a show scheduled for June in Tel Aviv heeding calls by activists in the boycott, divestment and sanction (BDS) movement.

The letter of support came in response to a full-page ad featured in the Washington Post that attacked Lorde for her decision. The ad was sponsored by the Word Values Network, an organization run by, Shmuley Boteach, a supporter of US President Donald Trump whose main donors include right-wing settlement funder, Sheldon Adelson.

The final exam for one California State University-Northridge class left students with little doubt as to their professor’s opinion of Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton.

The online final for African Studies 161, “American Political Institutions: A Black Perspective,” taught by Professor Karin Stanford, asked students about both 2016 presidential nominees in similarly formatted questions, both of which included an “all of the above” option.

“Donald Trump frequently made statements of an _____ nature throughout this presidential campaign,” one question asked, offering students answer choices of “anti-Mexican,” “anti-Muslim,” “anti-woman,” and “all of the above.”

Over the last couple of years the once unbeatable sports network ESPN has gone full-scale liberal, firing various commentators who didn’t tow the new company line while allowing those that do work for the company to spread leftist disinformation masquerading as legitimate sports analysis.

Now, in a new low for the network, ESPN has aired a rant by commentator Max Kellerman that specifically brought up the widely discredited Russian collusion probe while pretending that it didn’t have anything to do with being a liberal or conservative.

In other words, according to the obvious implications put forth by Kellerman, good people are against Donald Trump and bad people support him.

Another day, another pathetic attack on Donald Trump, this time with the laughable claim that the president may not actually be able to read.

That’s right, Trump derangement syndrome has “reached its peak” and has even increased with the release of a so far uncorroborated book by anti-Trump author Michael Wolff that claims that almost every person who comes into contact with the president believes him to be a moron.

Keep in mind that this comes at the same time that the media and leftists throughout the country are also trying to claim that Trump is mentally unstable.

According to the bill, two thirds of the Knesset majority is required for Israel to relinquish sovereignty over any part of Jerusalem. International law insists that Israel has no sovereignty over East Jerusalem, illegally occupied and annexed in 1967 and 1980 respectively.

An equally disturbing stipulation in the bill is that it removes two Palestinian neighborhoods from the municipal jurisdiction of the city.

The two affected neighborhoods are Kufr Aqab and the Shufat refugee camp.

By doing so, the Israeli government would have achieved another milestone in its demographic war on Palestinians.

Sudan has deployed thousands of government militia Rapid Support Forces (RSF) fighters to the eastern state of Kassala on the border with Eritrea.

Eyewitnesses in Kassala underscored the RSF militiamen on tanks and hundreds of vehicles with pintle-mounted weapons had arrived in the city on Thursday morning.

Sources told Sudan Tribune the RSF fighters were deployed in anticipation of internal Eritrean developments that could lead to a large wave of refugees hitting Sudan’s border.

While others claimed the purpose of the border closure is to prevent Darfur rebel elements and Ethiopia’s armed opposition fighters from infiltrating into Sudan’s territory due to these developments.

Forty-six, (46), of our senators, (democratic), voted to uphold the U.N. vote. This would have enabled our senators to take away our arms and give to a foreign country.

Please take note of the 46 senators, some may be in your states...we must vote them out.

Until recently, the Clinton Foundation has been monitored by the IRS, the Department of Justice, and the FBI, and multiple state government authorities that are seeded with persons loyal to either the Clintons or the Obamas.

Every time, the Clinton Foundation got a free pass.

But now it appears key authorities may finally be turning strict attention toward answering tough questions about public filings of Clinton “charities” inside and outside the United States. When these powerful organizations engage motivated minds, they will wish to concentrate on a few areas that have long gone begging for attention.

The shady, liberal opposition research firm behind the discredited anti-Trump dossier uses smear tactics and intimidation to discredit people who go against its clients, a London-based Venezuelan journalist told Fox News Thursday.

In congressional testimony as well, Alek Boyd said Fusion GPS labeled him a “pedophile,” “extortionist” and “drug trafficker” after he criticized Derwick Associates, one of its clients.

“I believe that Fusion GPS’s business is to do basically whatever the paymasters tell them to do,” Boyd said in his first American TV interview. “They are particularly good at spreading misinformation, disinformation and smears.”

The journalist's testimony comes as a federal judge denied the firm's request to quash a congressional subpoena for their bank records.

So many people have fallen sick with influenza in California that pharmacies have run out of flu medicines, emergency rooms are packed, and the death toll is rising higher than in previous years.

Health officials said Friday that 27 people younger than 65 have died of the flu in California since October, compared with three at the same time last year. Nationwide and in California, flu activity spiked sharply in late December and continues to grow.

The lending business is heavily stacked against student borrowers. Bigger players can borrow for almost nothing, and if their investments don’t work out, they can put their corporate shells through bankruptcy and walk away. Not so with students. Their loan rates are high and if they cannot pay, their debts are not normally dischargeable in bankruptcy. Rather, the debts compound and can dog them for life, compromising not only their own futures but the economy itself.

The new year has only just begun, but already Democratic politicians in the country’s largest high-tax states are threatening lawsuits and publicly touting proposed workarounds to help compensate tax payers for the elimination of the state and local tax (SALT) deductions which were dramatically rolled back, along with deductions for mortgage interest, as part of the White House’s tax reform plan.

During his state of the state address earlier this week, New York Mayor Andrew Cuomo threatened to sue the federal government over the tax bill, claiming that the plan is unconstitutional and overly burdensome to New Yorkers.

America’s declining influence in the Middle East and the Pacific Rim has been in hyperdrive this week following President Trump’s tweetstorm against Pakistan.

On New Year's day, Trump unleashed a series of tweets accusing Pakistan of harboring terrorists, and went so far as to threaten cutting off the country’s financial aid. To make matters worse, U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations Nikki Haley, also accused Pakistan of playing “a double game for years,” and said President Trump would withhold $225 million in aid to the country.

Trump’s tweetstorm did not impress the Pakistani government: in response, it announced that it would be evicting some 1.4 million Afghan refugees from the country later this month. The Pakistani government also announced closer ties with China, and would ditch the dollar in bilateral trade with China, a move that has threatened Washington’s diplomatic relations with Pakistan.

Snow started falling about 6 a.m. Thursday in Syracuse, and it hasn't stopped since.

The National Weather Service's hourly logs from Hancock International Airport show snow falling at every hourly reading since 5:54 a.m. Thursday. (Chart below.)

So far, 18 inches has fallen in this storm, the weather service reported today. And there's more to come.

"Persistent bands of lake effect snow will continue to impact the region through this afternoon," the weather service said in a special bulletin this morning.

The snow has made a mess of commutes Thursday and Friday. On Friday alone, about 200 accidents and vehicles off the road were reported in Onondaga County alone.

In response to criticism over its role in the childhood obesity epidemic, the food industry vowed to only run TV ads for “healthier” foods to kids. Critics say the industry’s self-imposed rules don’t do much beyond giving them good publicity.

People continue to flee the indebted, pension ponzi burdened liberal states of America in record numbers, with Illinois, Connecticut, New Jersey and California all ranking at the very top of the most ditched states of 2017.

The bank for opposition research firm Fusion GPS handed over financial records on Friday, after a Federal judge struck down the firm's attempt to conceal the records from the House Intelligence Committee the previous day.

At issue are 70 financial transactions from 2016, however Committee Chairman Devin Nunes (R-CA) demanded "complete" records going all the way back to Aug. 2015 Fusion filed for an injunction - claiming Nunes issued the subpoena illegally, it was overly broad, and it was a violation of the 1st amendment.

In yet another example of the insanity that is the new liberal orthodoxy in the age of Trump, multiple mainstream news outlets, as well as numerous left-wing activists, are now publicly calling for Twitter to ban President Trump from their platform for threatening North Korea.

You read that correctly. American media outlets are not only defending North Korea, they are actually claiming that threatening the rogue nuclear nation constitutes “hateful speech” that must be censored.

Articles in the Washington Post, the New York Times, Slate Magazine, and the Globe and Mail have all called for censoring the president in the last week, ostensibly because of his threats against North Korea but in reality because the legacy media absolutely despises the fact that the president can speak to the American people without going through the establishment gatekeepers first.

Identity Politics has responded with outrage against People Magazine’s choice of white male country singer Blake Shelton as “sexiest man in the world.”

According to adherents of Identity Politics, the choice indicates that People Magazine is itself racist and part of the white supremacy movement to elavate white people above people of color.

The choice is doubly outrageous because, according to a writer in Salon, it reinforces and celebrates toxic white male sexuality and elevates a white man to a position of popular acclaim.

Every white person needs to read this article — http://www.unz.com/article/the-end-of-white-celebrity/— to understand how they are being demonized and marginalized to the point of oblivion.

On Saturday, The New York Post published a recording of a phone call she provided them in which a man is heard telling her: 'You're going to die a slow and painful death you f****** b****'.

I was in the grocery store a while back when, after my items were tabulated, the checkout clerk asked, “Would you like to contribute to the Wounded Warriors fund?”

I glanced at the line of people to my left — a little cross-section of America — and feeling a little skeptical about how they’d respond, I said, “No I don’t think so. I’d rather put my money towards some anti-war organization working to try and make sure that there are no more wounded soldiers, and to relief organizations that are supporting the hundreds of thousands of victims of America’s illegal wars abroad.”

The clerk looked a little taken aback and muttered “okay,” but to my surprise, nobody spoke up in the line. I was expecting at least one person to call me out as a “terrorist supporter” or a “commie” or who knows what, but instead there was just silence.

More than 500 people living on Kadovar Island, East Sepik Province of Papua New Guinea have been evacuated following the first eruption of Kadovar volcano in known history. This volcano, dormant until yesterday, is part of the Schouten Islands, and lies off the coast of New Guinea, about 25 km (15 miles) N of the mouth of the Sepik River. The latest activity at this volcano was a period of heightened thermal phenomena in 1976. The Aviation Color Code for the volcano was raised to Orange. 50 - 60 percent of the island is already covered in lava.

The Jerusalem Municipality Workers Union announced Saturday night a general strike, starting at midnight, following Mayor Nir Barkat’s declaration last week that 2,150 workers will be laid off due to a budget strife with the Finance Ministry.

The union’s chairman, Avichai Avraham, said in a statement that all services – including garbage removal and reception of the public in the municipally itself and its branches – will be halted.

Explosive new book details President Trump's first year in the White House; book quotes former Chief Strategist Bannon as saying regarding Trump's peace plan: 'Let Jordan take the West Bank, let Egypt take Gaza. Let them deal with it. Or sink trying'; Trump also reportedly told multiple people son-in-law Kushner was qualified to handle Israeli-Palestinian peace because 'the Kushners know all the crooks in Israel.'

Some 1,500 people congregate in Tel Aviv's Bima Square, plan to march to city's Government Quarter in protest of corruption, mishandling of PM Netanyahu's investigations; 'Where the government is corrupt, no social justice can exist,' said organizer of the 1973 Yom Kippur War protests.

An application that recommends to a company commander the safest route to a Hamas target and software that displays for a battalion commander bird's-eye satellite footage of the village he is preparing to enter in southern Lebanon. These are just some of the technological advances that are being developed by the IDF's new Unit 3060—a development unit attached to the Military Intelligence Directorate that was unveiled for the first time Wednesday.

In the midst of a national financial catastrophe, Rep. Maxine Waters (D-CA) used her position as a senior member of Congress and member of the House Financial Services Committee to prevail upon Treasury officials to meet with OneUnited Bank. She never disclosed that her husband held stock in the bank. This outrageous conduct has led Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington (CREW) to include the congresswoman as one of the Most Corrupt Members of Congress.

Al Gore is starting to look less like an “expert” and more like a radical zealot.

Palestinian Christians have attacked the convoy carrying the Greek Orthodox Patriarch of Jerusalem al-Quds as he was visiting the Israeli-occupied West Bank, blaming him for controversial land sales to Israeli investors.

The protesters blocked Patriarch Theophilos III's motorcade as he was being driven towards a church in Bethlehem on Saturday, chanting "traitor, traitor," The Jerusalem Post reported.

The religious leader is accused of allowing controversial sales of the church’s property to groups contributing to Israel’s illegally-built settlements in East al-Quds. Palestinians consider East al-Quds the capital of their future state.

The protesters smashed the windows of three cars in the convoy, but not the Patriarch's vehicle.

The Islamic Republic of Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei evoked the radical Black Lives Matter movement last week in a tweet slamming the United States for committing supposed “oppression” of “black women, men, & children for no justifiable reason.”

In a tweet sent from his account, Khamenei wrote, “The U.S. gov. commits oppression inside the U.S., too. U.S. police murder black women, men, & children for no justifiable reason, and the murderers are acquitted in U.S. courts. This is their judicial system! And they slam other countries’ and our country’s judicial system. #BLM“:

Pop singer Lily Allen has claimed Muslim grooming gang victims could have been “raped or abused by somebody else at some point” if the gangs were not active in the UK.

Ms. Allen also claimed that there is a certain “type” of rapist who attacks their stepdaughter and is 100 per cent “British white” during a discussion about Muslim rape gangs and immigration on Twitter.

Street artist Sabo has apparently trolled Hollywood celebrities arriving for Sunday night’s Golden Globes in Los Angeles with artwork implying that many of them knew about widespread allegations of sexual misconduct in the entertainment industry, and did nothing to act.

Over the next three years Xi Jinping’s anti-poverty crusade - which the Communist party leader has declared one of the key themes of his second five-year term - will see millions of marginalised rural dwellers resettled in new, government-subsidised homes.

Some are being moved to distant urban housing estates, others just to slightly less remote or unforgiving rural locations. Other poverty-fighting tactics – including loans, promoting tourism and “pairing” impoverished families with local officials whose careers are tied to their plight – are also being used.

By 2020, Beijing hopes to have helped 30 million people rise above its official poverty line of about 70p a day while simultaneously reinforcing the already considerable authority of Xi, now seen as China’s most powerful ruler since Mao Zedong.

Austria sparked controversy earlier this week after they declared plans to cut benefits for children living abroad - a move that could break EU rules and enrage Brussels' hierarchy.

There is mounting concern of a showdown between Austria and the EU, after the country's new coalition Government included a far-right, eurosceptic party.

The latest policy move prompted Jean-Claude Junckrr's deputy chief spokeswoman to issue a warning that the European Commission was closely monitoring the situation.

ANGELA Merkel who has been a central architect at the heart of the European Project during her tenure as German Chancellor will shock Brussels by refusing to go ahead with integration, according to a leading Harvard professor.

European Commissioner Günther Oettinger, 64, says in an interview with DER SPIEGEL that a United States of Europe is a worthwhile goal. He urges Germany to take French President Macron's proposals seriously -- and to form a government as soon as possible

German Chancellor Angela Merkel - weakened by a humiliating election setback in September - has fallen from "Europe's most powerful leader to one of its most insecure".

According to John Simpson, the BBC's World Affairs editor, Mrs Merkel's second bid to build a coalition government "is not looking good".

Talks to form another 'grand coalition' with the Social Democrats (SPD) are set to begin tomorrow, but experts believe any deal struck will be voted down by party members.

Simpson told Radio 4's Today programme: "No-one would have predicted it, but she is far less secure in her job than Theresa May is in hers.

The EU’s chief Brexit negotiator had already caused outrage after sneering at Theresa May’s blue passport victory.

And yesterday, he was at it again, warning that nations which decided to go it alone “will fail”.

He tweeted: “Individual countries can't solve the challenges we face.

“From climate change to human trafficking, nationalists and populists are unable to provide the answers and that's why they will fail #WeAreEurope”

Michael Wolff, the author of Fire And Fury: Inside The Trump White House, suggested that the UK could jeopardise a Brexit trade deal with the US if Donald Trump is not invited to the Royal Wedding on May 19.

Prince Harry and Meghan reportedly want former president Barack Obama and his wife Michelle to attend their wedding.

Government officials are worried, however, that President Trump will take great offence if he is not invited as well.

As US-based social media companies crack down on dissent at home in the name of fighting phantom ‘Russian meddling,’ Washington seeks to leverage them for regime change in places like Iran.
If social media platform Twitter can ban German politicians for incitement (of race hate), then why doesn’t it apply the same sanction on President Trump over his incendiary comments regarding Iranian protests?

Arguably, Trump’s incitement is far graver. He is recklessly encouraging violence in a whole nation. The arrogance is astounding and yet Twitter and other US news media just go along with it. So too do European leaders and media.

Trump and his administration have been full-on in public statements egging on protests which broke out in Iran last week. Trump’s denouncing of the Iranian government as “brutal and corrupt” and urging “time for change” is a brazen incitement to sedition.

As US-based social media companies crack down on dissent at home in the name of fighting phantom ‘Russian meddling,’ Washington seeks to leverage them for regime change in places like Iran.
If social media platform Twitter can ban German politicians for incitement (of race hate), then why doesn’t it apply the same sanction on President Trump over his incendiary comments regarding Iranian protests?

Arguably, Trump’s incitement is far graver. He is recklessly encouraging violence in a whole nation. The arrogance is astounding and yet Twitter and other US news media just go along with it. So too do European leaders and media.

Trump and his administration have been full-on in public statements egging on protests which broke out in Iran last week. Trump’s denouncing of the Iranian government as “brutal and corrupt” and urging “time for change” is a brazen incitement to sedition.

Former National Security Advisor Michael Flynn's guilty plea has triggered a heated debate on the prospects of the Trump-Russia investigation. Speaking to Sputnik, Wall Street analyst Charles Ortel opined that potential disclosures are not a cause for US President Donald Trump's concern, adding that the Clintons’ case deserves far more scrutiny.

"In practice, it is certain that insiders in many nations where privatization happened (not only in the former Soviet Union, but across Central Europe and the rest of the world) likely appropriated many billions of dollars (arguably far more than that) by transferring valuable assets at low prices, and other thefts, often with the support and connivance of many politicians who also were in on the game," Ortel explained.

Washington is planning 'concrete steps' toward providing a Syrian Democratic Forces-controlled area in northern Syria's eastern Euphrates area three times the size of Lebanon with diplomatic recognition, a leading Arabic international newspaper has reported.

The 28,000 square km territory, controlled by the Syrian Democratic Forces, a collection of predominantly Kurdish militias including the YPG People's Protection Units, took its first step toward US recognition after US Defense Secretary Jim Mattis promised to send US diplomats to SDF-controlled areas to work alongside US troops operating in the region, the official said.