Wanderlust

Tag: War Conflict

  • As tensions rise, U.S. ends refueling of Saudi planes

    The Pentagon said late Friday the U.S. would no longer refuel planes for the Saudi Arabia-led coalition battling Houthi rebels in Yemen, suggesting the Trump administration may be taking concrete step

    The Pentagon said late Friday the U.S. would no longer refuel planes for the Saudi Arabia-led coalition battling Houthi rebels in Yemen, suggesting the Trump administration may be taking concrete steps to end support for the controversial war amid continued reports of high civilian casualties.

    The move also comes at tense time for Washington and Riyadh following the death of U.S.-based journalist Jamal Khashoggi, who was killed inside the Saudi consulate in Turkey last month. The incident has ratcheted up tensions between the two nations and sparked strong calls on Capitol Hill to cut off arms sales and military support for Saudi Arabia, along with imposing possible economic sanctions.

    On Yemen, top administration officials have said recently it’s time to end the conflict and move to a peaceful resolution.

    Both the U.S. and Saudi Arabia over the weekend tried to cast the decision to end refueling as a mutual one, though U.S. officials reportedly believed it was time to end the controversial policy that had faced intense international criticism as reports of civilian carnage rose.

    “We support the decision by the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, after consultations with the U.S. government, to use the coalition’s own military capabilities to conduct inflight refueling in support of its operations in Yemen,” Defense Secretary James Mattis said in a statement late Friday night. “The U.S. and the Coalition are planning to collaborate on building up legitimate Yemeni forces to defend the Yemeni people, secure their country’s borders, and contribute to counter Al Qaeda and ISIS efforts in Yemen and the region.”

    “The U.S. will also continue working with the coalition and Yemen to minimize civilian casualties and expand urgent humanitarian efforts throughout the country,” he continued. “Recognizing continued bipartisan interest from Congress, the administration is appreciative of the continued dialogue we have had with key members on this issue and look forward to working together to support the United Nations’ ongoing efforts on this new phase in Yemen.”

    In its own statement, Riyadh said it simply no longer needs America’s help with refueling.

    “Recently the kingdom and the coalition has increased its capability to independently conduct inflight refueling in Yemen,” read a statement released on state-run Saudi television. “As a result, in consultation with the United States, the coalition has requested cessation of inflight refueling support for its operations in Yemen.”

    While it’s unclear exactly what impact the policy change will have on the Saudi-led war in Yemen, what is clear is that the civilian death toll is rising. The Trump administration has repeatedly said it believes the Saudi-led coalition is doing all it can to reduce civilian casualties in the conflict, which is a key part of a broader proxy war between Saudi Arabia and Iran.

    But new figures show that civilian deaths are going up. Since the start of 2016, Saudi-led coalition airstrikes have killed at least 4,489 civilians, according to figures from the Armed Conflict Location & Event Data Project.

    So far this year, 1,254 civilians have been killed, a rate of about four people each day. Last year, 1,386 civilians were killed, or about 3.79 per day, meaning the frequency of civilian deaths is actually rising, not falling as U.S. officials claim.

    Administration officials have over the past several weeks publicly called for an end to the war.

    “It is time to end this conflict, replace conflict with compromise, and allow the Yemeni people to heal through peace and reconstruction,” Secretary of State Mike Pompeo said recently.

  • Trump slams France’s Macron over need for ‘European army’ to defend against Russia, China

    President Donald Trump took to social media Friday to chastise French President Emanuel Macron’s calls for a “true European army” to defend the continent against increasing threats from Russia, China

    President Donald Trump took to social media Friday to chastise French President Emanuel Macron’s calls for a “true European army” to defend the continent against increasing threats from Russia, China and other near-peer adversaries.

    In a Twitter post, Mr. Trump characterized Mr. Macron’s claims as “very insulting” to the long-standing mutual defense agreements between Washington and Paris, as part of the NATO alliance. In the Twitter posting, Mr. Trump also took France and other western European nations to task for not meeting the U.S. demand for NATO members to contribute two percent of their country’s gross domestic product to the alliance’s defense.

    “President Macron of France has just suggested that Europe build its own military in order to protect itself from the U.S., China and Russia. Very insulting,” Mr. Trump wrote. “But perhaps Europe should first pay its fair share of NATO, which the U.S. subsidizes greatly!” he added in the social media posting.

    Mr. Trump’s comments come days before he and Russian President Vladimir Putin are slated to meet with Mr. Macron in Paris, for commemoration ceremonies dedicated to end of World War I. Administration officials indicated Mr. Trump and Mr. Putin would hold a face-to-face meeting on the sidelines of the ceremonies, but that plan was later scrubbed by the White House.

    The young French leader voiced the need for a “true European Army” to fortify the continent’s eastern borders, during an interview with Europe 1 on Tuesday.

    “We have to protect ourselves with respect to China, Russia and even the United States of America,” Mr. Macron said, adding European leaders “will not protect the Europeans unless we decide to have a true European army.”

    Citing the Trump administration’s souring view on NATO, particularly its chastising of France, Germany and other alliance members for not paying their fair share toward Europe’s defense, Mr. Macron said western allies on the continent “need a Europe which defends itself better alone, without just depending on the United States, in a more sovereign manner.”

  • U.S, Chinese officials spar over South China Sea engagements

    Top U.S. and Chinese defense officials and diplomats traded rhetorical barbs over ongoing American and allied military operations in the South China Sea, undercutting the message of cooperation and un

    Top U.S. and Chinese defense officials and diplomats traded rhetorical barbs over ongoing American and allied military operations in the South China Sea, undercutting the message of cooperation and unity between the two world powers during bilateral talks held in Washington on Friday.

    Defense Secretary James N. Mattis reiterated Washington’s stance that U.S. fighters, bombers and warships would “continue to fly and sail wherever international law allows” in the South China Sea and elsewhere in the Pacific.

    “We continue to operate in international waters and airspace as all nations are entitled to,” Mr. Mattis said during a press conference at the State Department alongside Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, Director of the Office of Foreign Affairs of the Central Commission of the Communist Party of China Yang Jiechi and Chinese Defense Minister Wei Fenghe.

    His comments came after Mr. Yang claimed freedom of navigation through the contested waterways of the South China Sea, or or overflight across its airspace, is not being contested by Beijing, adding that any claim to the contrary and to use such claims as a reason for military action is “unacceptable”

    For his part, Mr. Wei said Washington and Beijing “stand to gain from cooperation and stand to lose from confrontation” in the South China Sea. “Confrontation and conflict … spells disaster for all,” he added.

    “The situation in the South China Sea is trending toward greater stability,” Mr. Wei noted, adding that Beijing continues to “urge the U.S. to play a constructive role” in maintaining that stability.

    Aside from Friday’s press conference at the State Department, Mr. Mattis and Mr. Wei are also scheduled to hold one-on-one talks Friday afternoon at the Pentagon.

    Discussions over a possible meeting between the two defense leaders had been percolating since October, when they held a sideline meeting during a regional national security conference in Singapore. But U.S.-China military relations quickly soured thereafter. Tensions reached a head when the White House nixed a previously scheduled visit by Mr. Mattis to Beijing that month.

    Friday’s meetings at the State Department and Pentagon were part of the second annual U.S.-China Diplomatic and Security Dialogue. Aside from the South China Sea, both sides sought to reinforce the notion of increasingly positive ties between the two countries.

    “The U.S. is not pursuing a Cold War or containment policy with China,” Mr. Pompeo said, adding “cooperation remains essential on many, many issues” ranging from a denuclearized North Korea to curbing Iranian influence across the globe.

    “The military-to-military relationship is moving forward and maintaining growth, despite some problems” between the U.S. and China, Mr. Wei said. China’s military buildup in the South China Sea “represents a growing force for world peace … and is transparent and for the protection of the Chinese people,” and is not a threat to the interests of the U.S. and its Pacific allies, he added.

  • Australian police say stabbing attack linked to terrorism

    A knife-wielding man stabbed three people, one fatally, in Australia’s second-largest city on Friday in an attack police linked to terrorism.

    SYDNEY (AP) — A knife-wielding man stabbed three people, one fatally, in Australia’s second-largest city on Friday in an attack police linked to terrorism.

    The attack during the afternoon rush hour brought central Melbourne to a standstill. Hundreds of people watched from behind barricades as police tried to apprehend the attacker.

    Police said the man got out of a pickup truck, which then caught fire, and attacked three bystanders with a knife. He also attempted to attack police who arrived on the scene before being shot in the chest by an officer.

    The suspect died later at a hospital. One of the victims also died, while the two others were hospitalized.

    Police said the attacker’s vehicle contained several barbecue gas cylinders in the back. A bomb squad rendered them safe without any exploding.

    Victoria state police Commissioner Graham Ashton said the suspect, who was originally from Somalia, was known to police and the incident was being treated as terrorism.

    “From what we know of that individual we are treating this as a terrorism incident,” Ashton told reporters, adding that the police counterterrorism command was working on the case, as well as homicide detectives.

    “He’s known to police mainly in respect to relatives that he has which certainly are persons of interest to us, and he’s someone that accordingly is know to both Victorian police and the Federal intelligence authorities,” he said.

    The attack occurred on the eve of a busy weekend in Melbourne, with a major horse race scheduled for Saturday and a national league soccer match the following day. Sunday is also Remembrance Day, when memorial ceremonies for World War I are held.

    Ashton said police were “doing security reassessments of these events in light of what’s occurred,” but there was “no ongoing threat we’re currently aware of in relation to people surrounding this individual.”

    Prime Minister Scott Morrison condemned the “evil and cowardly attack.”

    “Australians will never be intimidated by these appalling attacks and we will continue to go about our lives and enjoy the freedoms that the terrorists detest,” he said in a statement.

    One witness said one of the stabbing victims, believed to be a man in his 60s who later died, was stabbed in the face, and that desperate efforts were made to save him.

    “Because he was on his stomach, they turned him over to see if he’s all right, he was still alive,” the witness, Markel Villasin, told Australian Associated Press.

    “He was breathing and he was bleeding out.”

    Video from the scene showed a man swinging a knife at two police officers near a burning car before he was shot.

  • ISIS insurgency, sleeper cells to take years to defeat

    Fully defeating the Islamic State and rooting out sleeper cells that have spread across the Middle East and Africa could take years, the Defense Department’s inspector general said

    The Islamic State may have lost the vast majority of physical territory it once held in Syria and Iraq, but fully defeating the terrorist group and rooting out sleeper cells that have spread across the Middle East and Africa could take years, the Defense Department’s inspector general said in a sweeping and at times critical review Monday that suggests final victory remains distant.

    The report said that a “reduced, covert version” of the Islamic State — also known as ISIS — maintains a presence not just in Iraq and Syria but also in Afghanistan, Libya, Somalia and Yemen. Islamic State, the report concluded, has evolved “from a land-holding terrorist entity to an insurgency” that operates numerous clandestine cells around the world.

    At a time when the Trump administration has sent mixed signals about the commitment of U.S. troops to the fights, “clearing terrorists from remote and largely ungoverned terrain is a low and difficult process, and eliminating ISIS from rural Iraq and Syria could take years,” the report says.

    The Pentagon in recent months has put forward two separate narratives in describing the fight against Islamic State, which began in 2014 under President Obama. When the U.S.-led international operation began, Islamic State held vast swaths of territory across Iraq and Syria, controlled a “capital city” in Raqqa, Syria, and boasted a sizable fighting force.

    Defense Department officials say Islamic State now has been “territorially defeated” and has lost nearly all of the land it once used as a base of operations.

    But officials also have said that the transformation of the Islamic State into an underground terrorist group presents challenges of its own. The inspector general described the recapture of Islamic State-held territory — the result of a relentless U.S.-led bombing campaign and ground operations inside Iraq and Syria — as just one phase of the mission.

    “There are significant challenges to developing capable and self-sufficient security forces in Iraq and Syria, and questions remain about the length of time it will take to train forces capable of preventing an ISIS resurgence,” the report says. “There are also significant challenges to U.S. efforts to address non-military issues, such as the promotion of democratic governance and civil society and the stabilization of liberated areas. These issues can also affect the ability of security forces to defeat Islamic State. Ongoing political uncertainty in Iraq and civil war in Syria also complicate efforts to confront an ISIS insurgency.”

    In Iraq specifically, deep-rooted issues with the Iraqi Security Forces make it difficult to eradicate the pockets of Islamic State fighters that remain across the country, and will likely require a long-term Pentagon commitment. Islamic State fighters driven from Syria are increasingly finding sanctuary across the border in Iraq, the inspector general’s report said.

    “The ISF continues to suffer from poor management of intelligence; corruption and … overlapping command arrangements with conflicting chains of command; micromanagement; and inefficient and inadequate systems for planning and transmitting orders,” the report said.

    Islamic State still has an estimated 20,000 to 30,000 fighters, both foreign and local, scattered across the region. Even before the release of Monday’s report, top U.S. military officials stressed that it was far too early to declare the group dead and buried.

    “Despite recent successes against ISIS and positive trends, we know there’s actually much work to be done,” Gen. Joseph F. Dunford, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, said last month. “ISIS is far from defeated and has a presence in countries from West Africa to Southeast Asia. Its ideology continues to inspire homegrown violent extremists in many of our countries.”

  • Saudis press Yemen campaign despite U.S. warnings

    The Saudi-led Arab coalition in Yemen is showing no sign of scaling back its brutal campaign to defeat Iranian-backed Houthi separatists from the war-torn nation, despite explicit and public demands f

    The Saudi-led Arab coalition in Yemen is showing no sign of scaling back its brutal campaign to defeat Iranian-backed Houthi separatists from the war-torn nation, despite explicit and public demands from top Trump administration officials in recent days to end the three-year conflict amid a massive and growing humanitarian crisis.

    On Monday, Yemeni government forces backed by Saudi Arabian and Emirati air power launched a multipronged offensive as part of a campaign to retake the strategically important port city of Hodeidah, in Houthi-held southeast Yemen. Government troops and members of the Shia separatist group have engaged in intense fighting in and around the port city for the last four days, according to local reports.

    Saudi, Yemeni and Emirati forces in June tried and failed to seize the critical port city, despite Riyadh launching the largest offensive of the war against the Iranian-backed separatists. The June offensive and the current effort in Hodeidah signal a new escalation of the conflict by Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman.

    The new wave of attacks comes less than a week after Defense Secretary James Mattis, quickly echoed by Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, demanded all parties participate in U.N.-led peace talks scheduled for next month. There has been mounting congressional criticism of U.S. backing for the Saudi war in Yemen, including logistical and intelligence support for Saudi forces.

    “We want to see everybody around a peace table based on a cease-fire [in Yemen], based on a pullback from the border, and then based on ceasing dropping of bombs,” Mr. Mattis told the Washington-based U.S. Institute for Peace last week. ” … We need to be doing this in the next 30 days” to end the war.

    Mr. Pompeo said Riyadh and its allies should play a meaningful role in U.N. peace talks led by Special Envoy to Yemen Martin Griffiths in Sweden.

    Officials in Sanaa and Riyadh told Agence France-Presse that the new Hodeidah offensive is geared toward encircling several major Houthi strongholds inside the city, in an attempt to cut those rebel redoubts off from resupply by Iranian military advisers. Fighting in and above the embattled city has been fierce, according to eyewitnesses. Humanitarian groups warn that Hodeidah is also a critical supply port for aid in what is already the region’s poorest country.

    “Hodeidah has become a ghost city, people stay indoors and the streets are deserted,” Isaac Ooko, Hodeidah area manager for the Norwegian Refugee Council, told the Reuters news agency.

    Mohammed Ali al-Huthi, head of the Houthi revolutionary council, told Al Jazeera on Monday that the Arab coalition’s renewed attacks on Hodeidah “a strenuous attempt to block talks aimed at ending the war and finding peace.”

    At the Pentagon, department officials declined to comment on the new Saudi-led offensive and whether it represented a direct rebuke to the Trump administration.

    “We continue to strongly support the efforts of Special Envoy Martin Griffiths to bring all sides of the conflict to the negotiating table,” Pentagon spokesperson Navy Cmdr. Rebecca Rebarich said in a statement.

    Riyadh’s heavy-handed strategy to defeat the Houthis, which has reportedly included the use of cluster bombs banned under the international rules of war, has failed to dislodge the Houthis, while reportedly slaughtered thousands of civilians and initiating one of the world’s worst humanitarian crises.

    There has been some talk the Hodeidah offensive is a last-ditch bid to seize territory before a peace accord is signed, in order to shape the postwar settlement in Yemen.

    “The Hodeidah operation is fraught with risk for the [Saudi] coalition,” the Middle East Institute’s Gerald M. Feierstein, ambassador to Yemen under President Obama, wrote on Monday, especially in the wake of the global outrage over the apparent killing of dissident Saudi journalist Jamal Khashoggi by Saudi government agents in Turkey last month.

    “Frustration with the conflict in Yemen continues to mount,” Mr. Feierstein said, adding, “Any mass-casualty event in Hodeidah could effectively end Western cooperation with the coalition.”

  • 6 detained in suspected plot to attack French president

    A French judicial official says six people have been arrested on preliminary terrorism charges, suspected of plotting to attack French President Emmanuel Macron.

    PARIS (AP) — A French judicial official says six people have been arrested on preliminary terrorism charges, suspected of plotting to attack French President Emmanuel Macron.

    The official, speaking on condition of anonymity to discuss the allegations, said intelligence agents detained the six in three widely scattered regions, including the Alps, Brittany and near the Belgian border. He said the plan appeared to be vague and unfinalized but violent.

    Macron is in Verdun on Tuesday as part of World War I commemorations and hosts U.S. President Donald Trump this weekend.

  • Angela Merkel: Arms sales to Saudis are on hold

    German Chancellor Angela Merkel said Friday her country is not ready to export arms to Saudi Arabia until the killing of Saudi journalist Jamal Khashoggi is properly investigated.

    ISTANBUL (AP) — German Chancellor Angela Merkel said Friday her country is not ready to export arms to Saudi Arabia until the killing of Saudi journalist Jamal Khashoggi is properly investigated.

    Speaking in Prague through a translator after meeting her Czech counterpart Andrej Babis, Merkel said it’s necessary to clarify the background of the crime that took place in the Saudi Consulate in Istanbul.

    She said Germany has made it clear that until then, “we won’t deliver any arms to Saudi Arabia.”

    Merkel also again said that Saudi Arabia has to ensure access for humanitarian aid to get into Yemen, which has been ravaged by a 3½-year war between the Saudi-led alliance and Shite rebels.

  • U.K. opens all military jobs, including elite SAS, to women

    U.K. officials cheered a military milestone this week: all armed forces roles are open to women.

    U.K. officials cheered a military milestone this week: all armed forces roles are now open to women.

    The elite Special Air Service (SAS) and the Royal Marines are looking to fill their ranks with women who are ready, willing and able.

    Defense Secretary Gavin Williamson made the announcement on Thursday.

    SEE ALSO: British SAS battle requires hand-to-hand combat; ISIS fighter drowned in puddle

    “Women have led the way with exemplary service in the armed forces for over 100 years, working in a variety of specialist and vital roles,” he said in a press release, Military Times reported. “So I am delighted that from today, for the first time in its history, our armed forces will be determined by ability alone and not gender.”

    The move fulfills an integration process that began in 2016 when combat field jobs were first made available to women.

    “We recognize people for their ability, not their gender, so any person with the right skills to be a Commando is welcome in the Royal Marines,” Maj. Gen. Charlie Stickland, commandant general Royal Marines, added in a press release.

    New recruits can apply for the positions in December. Existing personnel may immediately seek out a new military occupational specialty.

  • Israel retaliates on Hamas targets in Zeitoun, Tel Al-Hawa

    From certain parts of this crowded city, one doesn’t hear rockets like the salvo fired from the Gaza Strip in the twilight hours of Wednesday morning, nor the more than two dozen retaliatory strikes b

    GAZA CITY, Gaza — From certain parts of this crowded city, one doesn’t hear rockets like the salvo fired from the Gaza Strip in the twilight hours of Wednesday morning, nor the more than two dozen retaliatory strikes by the Israeli Defense Forces shortly after.

    The electricity was out in the hotel across from the sea, a regular occurrence. The street was quiet, and there was no internet service, limiting what residents here can learn of the violence raging just blocks away.

    In the early morning hours of Wednesday, Hamas terrorists fired a rocket towards Israel and made a direct hit on a home in the city of Beersheva, gutting the second floor. While there were no injuries, a mother and her children who had hid in their bomb shelter were treated for “shock” — an all-encompassing term for the nervous breakdown that occurs for people in this area experiencing frequent near-death experiences.

    In retaliation, Israeli fighter jets targeted at least 12 Hamas military targets in the Tel Al-Hawa neighborhood and Zeitoun, close to Gaza City. The targets included tunnel-digging sites and a factory used for the manufacturing of aerial weaponry, according to the office of the Israeli Defense Forces (IDF) spokesman.

    In the south of the Strip, the IDF targeted tunnel digging sites and a maritime terror tunnel shaft in Khan Yunis, and weapon manufacturing factories in Rafah, the Gazan city on the border with Egypt.

    The IDF also released video footage Wednesday showing a strike on a terrorist squad that attempted to launch rockets at an Israeli community in the Hof Ashkelon Regional Council, an area that borders Gaza to the north.

    In the video, a man in sandals, white pants and a long sleeve shirt is seen setting up a launching pad for a rocket. Another man with blue jeans, a black shirt and a gray vest is seen loading a rocket into a launcher before the entire site explodes with the IDF attack.

    “This, sadly, is the normal here in Gaza — and there’s no major impact other than it just keeps the level of anxiety and nervousness very high,” said Matthias Schamle, the director of operations for UNRWA Gaza, the troubled U.N. agency that aids Palestinian refugees, in an interview. As Mr. Schamle spoke in his office in Gaza City, Hamas members milled about outside.

    Border closings at Erez, the main crossing point in the north, and Kerem Shalom in the south, can affect the delivery of needed materials from Israel into the Gaza Strip, he said.

    “I keep saying, more broadly, that things remain tense here and that we don’t think anyone wants war — on either the Israeli or Palestinian side here — but incidents by hotheads, if I may call it this way, on either side could trigger a war,” he said.

    Border closings and the threat of a war could complicate travel around the Gaza Strip, complicating efforts by a reporter to get a full picture of the conflict.

    An Israeli press office in Jerusalem confirms the closure of the border but offers no information on when it would be open.

    “That’s above my pay grade,” said one IDF spokesman.

    Electricity was inconsistent on a three-day visit to the densely populated Palestinian enclave, a reality Gazans have become accustomed to and a challenge by shop, restaurant and cafe owners meet with their own generators.

    By mid-morning after the exchange of fire, the streets of Gaza City were packed with cars and people — young men and women heading to the Islamic University of Gaza and Al-Azhar University. An email from the Israeli Government Press Office announced that the Erez crossing had re-opened, but only until 3:30 p.m.

    Without electricity, no stoplights work and people tend to drive through intersections with little regard for stopping, making the drive to the crossing before it closed a hazard in itself.

    At the Erez crossing, the first checkpoint on the Gaza side is controlled by Hamas.

    In October 2017, a little over a year to the day, the Palestinian government in Ramallah signed a reconciliation agreement with Hamas that would slowly transfer governing authority of the Gaza Strip back to the recognized PA government. The first step, in those early days, was for PA security forces to take over the Erez crossing.

    But that arrangement quickly broke down, as Hamas officals — distrusting the P.A. — set up their own makeshift checkpoint, complete with desks, laptops, and photocopy machines inside two office trailers.

    After a few minutes of conversation, a reporter was allowed to proceed through a gate, but still needed to take a $5 taxi ride half a mile to the Palestinian Authority checkpoint. The second check goes more quickly and border-crossers leave with no stamps in their passport.

    The Israeli checkpoint was still another mile to travel. A young Palestinian with a motorcycle and a trailer gave offered a lift. At the Israeli entrance were six heavy metal sliding doors, which remained shut and monitored by a security camera

    The hulking concrete of the security fence erected by Israel stretches out into the distance on either side of the crossing terminal. After a few minutes the doors creaked, slid open, and a traveler was back in Israel.