Jesus Malverde
Jesus Malverde's JournalSyrian Rebels Describe U.S.-Backed Training in Qatar
With reports indicating that forces loyal to Syrian President Bashar Assad are gaining ground in that country’s brutal civil war, moderate Syrian rebels have told a visiting journalist that the United States is arranging their training in Qatar.
In a documentary to be aired Tuesday night, the rebels describe their clandestine journey from the Syrian battlefield to meet with their American handlers in Turkey and then travel on to Qatar, where they say they received training in the use of sophisticated weapons and fighting techniques, including, one rebel said, “how to finish off soldiers still alive after an ambush.”
The interviews are the latest evidence that after more than three years of warfare, the United States has stepped up the provision of lethal aid to the rebels. In recent months, at least five rebel units have posted videos showing their members firing U.S.-made TOW anti-tank missiles at Syrian positions. The weapons are believed to have come from Saudi Arabia, but experts on international arms transfers have told McClatchy that they could not have been given to the rebels without the approval of the Obama administration.
The documentary, produced by FRONTLINE for airing on PBS stations, features journalist Muhammad Ali, who has been following the Syrian civil war for the program. It shows Ali meeting up with a seemingly moderate faction of the rebels, though the faction itself is not identified — apparently for fear of angering its American contacts.
http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/foreign-affairs-defense/syria-arming-the-rebels/syrian-rebels-describe-u-s-backed-training-in-qatar/
http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/syria-arming-the-rebels/
Molecular halal testing has turned up pig DNA in Cadbury’s chocolate
The dietary laws that forbid Jews and Muslims from eating pork date back millennia—but when they were laid down, nobody conceived of detection tools that could find minuscule traces of the forbidden foods.
Malaysia is the latest country to find itself with a tainted food scandal, after the government’s halal inspectors—who ensure that foods adhere to Islamic dietary laws—used a DNA test to find trace elements of pork in Cadbury chocolate bars. That forced corporate snack giant Mondelez, Cadbury’s parent company, to issue a recall of Cadbury Dairy Milk Hazelnut and Cadbury Dairy Milk Roast bars, and triggered the ire of Muslim groups.
“They stuffed pigs into our mouths, then apologized,” said Azwanddin of the non-profit group Hamzah Jaringan Melayu Malaysia, who threatened to sue Mondelez. “This cannot be allowed.” More than 20 Malay-Muslim groups called for a boycott of Cadbury.
Malaysia’s Islamic Development Department, known as Jakim, began using DNA tests to certify halal products in 2010. It announced in 2011 that it had detected pig DNA in Heinz’s HP Sauce and Tabasco hot sauce, though both companies disputed the finding. Commercial DNA tests can detect as little as 5 picograms (trillionths of a gram) of porcine DNA.
Read More: http://qz.com/213729/molecular-halal-testing-has-turned-up-pig-dna-in-cadburys-chocolate/#/h/72054,1/
U.S. investigates reports of American suicide bomber in Syria
Source: Reuters
U.S. government agencies were examining social media postings purporting to show how an American who was fighting with an Al Qaeda affiliate blew himself up recently in a suicide attack in northern Syria, U.S. officials said.
The officials, who declined to be identified, said U.S. agencies assessed that the postings were likely authentic. One said some investigators believed they knew the "U.S. person's" true identity, but declined to give further details.*
According to internet postings, the suicide bomber, who called himself "Abu Hurayra al-Amriki" carried out one of four suicide bombings on May 25 in Syria's Idlib province on behalf of Jabhat al-Nusra, al Qaeda's affiliate fighting to oust the government of President Bashar al Assad.
If his identity is confirmed, he would be the first American known to have committed a suicide bombing in Syria on behalf of al Qaeda, said Laith Alkhouri, a senior analyst with Flashpoint Global Partners, which monitors militant websites for government and private clients.
Read more: http://www.reuters.com/article/2014/05/28/us-syria-usa-bomber-idUSKBN0E824S20140528
Google discloses its (lack of) diversity
Source: USA Today
In a rare glimpse behind the tech curtain, Google on Wednesday released its diversity figures.
The numbers weren't good, but they were also in line with the few other companies that release such figures.
Eighty-three percent of Google's tech workers internationally are male. For non-tech jobs, the number is 52%. Its leadership is made of up 79% men.
In terms of racial diversity, the company overall is 61% white, 30% Asian, 3% Hispanic and 2% Black.
For tech positions, the numbers are similar—60% white, 34% Asian, 2% Hispanic and 1% Black.
In terms of leadership, the company skews more white. Seventy-two percent of its leaders are white, 23% Asian, 2% Black and 1% Hispanic.
Read more: http://www.usatoday.com/story/tech/2014/05/28/google-releases-employee-diversity-figures/9697049/
Violent scuffle as Brad Pitt is targeted by prankster Vitalii Sediuk on Maleficent red carpet
He's targeted everyone from Bradley Cooper to America Ferrera.
And Brad Pitt became prankster Vitalii Sediuk's latest victim at the premiere of fianceé Angelina Jolie's new movie Maleficent on Wednesday night.
Security instantly intervened as a violent scuffle broke out on the red carpet outside the El Capitan theatre on Hollywood Boulevard and Sediuk was later booked on suspicion of misdemeanor battery at the Hollywood Station.
Sediuk rushed past barriers and made contact with Pitt's face, before six to seven security men wrestled him to the ground.
Read More: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/tvshowbiz/article-2642404/Violent-scuffle-Brad-Pitt-targeted-prankster-Vitalii-Sediuk-Maleficent-red-carpet.html
Terror’s Front: Local Groups, Eyes on West
Source: NYTIMES
The Benghazi militant group Ansar al-Shariah is under attack by a renegade former general trying to rid Libya of political Islam. But in response, the militia has taken aim squarely at Washington.
“We remind America of their defeats in Afghanistan, Iraq and Somalia,” Mohammed Ali al-Zahawi, the leader of Ansar al-Shariah, declared this week in a videotaped statement, warning that the United States would face “much worse” if it tried to intervene in Libya.
Locked in a local battle for territory but with an eye cocked warily at the West, Mr. Zahawi is in many ways a prime example of the growing terrorist threat of “decentralized Al Qaeda affiliates and extremists” that President Obama described Wednesday in a speech at West Point. Although less able or inclined to strike the American homeland, this diffuse patchwork of groups now poses “the most direct threat” to the United States and its interests, especially abroad, Mr. Obama said.
Ansar al-Shariah of Benghazi, infamous for its role in the 2012 attack that killed Ambassador J. Christopher Stevens, is one of thousands of independent militant groups that have sprung up in loosely governed, lawless or war-torn territories across the Middle East and Africa — in places like Libya, Mali, Somalia, northern Nigeria, the Egyptian Sinai, Yemen, Iraq and most of all Syria.
Read more: http://www.nytimes.com/2014/05/29/world/middleeast/terrors-face-local-groups-eyes-on-west.html?_r=0
$59 trillion to go to heirs, charity by 2061
Source: CNBC
The greatest wealth transfer in history is underway, according to a new report.
A study from the Boston College Center on Wealth and Philanthropy projects that $59 trillion is expected to be passed down to heirs, charities and taxes between 2007 and 2061.
The study said heirs will receive $36 trillion over that period, while federal estate taxes will receive $5.6 trillion.
Total gifts to charity during the period of the study are expected to be more than $27 trillion, which includes sums from final estates (with no surviving spouse) as well as total lifetime giving.
Read more: http://www.cnbc.com/id/101711232
'Gun violence restraining order' pushed after Isla Vista rampage
Source: SF Gate
Two California legislators introduced a bill Tuesday to create a "gun violence restraining order" that they said would give family and friends of a person threatening to harm others the tools needed to take guns or to prevent the person from buying new ones.
California Assembly members Nancy Skinner, D-Berkeley, and Das Williams, D-Santa Barbara, say people should be able to intervene - much as a therapist can today - to notify law enforcement when someone they know appears likely to hurt others or themselves.
The bill, modeled after systems in Connecticut, Texas and Indiana, would require law enforcement officials to ask a judge to grant the firearm restraining order in a process similar to a domestic violence restraining order.
The language for AB1014 was drafted last year, Skinner said, but the bill was ultimately dropped as Democrats focused on other gun control legislation. Skinner revived it Tuesday after the shooting rampage on Friday at Isla Vista near UC Santa Barbara.
Read more: http://www.sfgate.com/crime/article/Gun-violence-restraining-order-pushed-after-5508835.php
Housing 1% soars as 99ers dive
As the housing recovery now moves in fits and still-weak starts, the super-pricey segment is sizzling. Sales of the most expensive 1 percent of homes in the U.S. are up 21 percent this year, according to a report from Redfin, a Seattle-based real estate brokerage. Sales in the remaining 99 percent are down 7.6 percent.
"There are haves and have nots, and the haves are the ones out buying," Redfin CEO Glenn Kelman said.
Ten local housing markets have seen sales growth above 50 percent this year, not surprisingly the top three in tech-heavy Northern California. Long Island, home to the hoity-toitiest Hamptons homes, has seen sales up 72 percent, and Seattle and Miami aren't far behind.
"The stock market had a record year and now it's begun to plateau, and so you see people moving their money out of the equity market and into the housing market," said Kelman.
Read More: http://www.cnbc.com/id/101707665
EXCLUSIVE: Edward Snowden Tells Brian Williams: 'I Was Trained as a Spy'
Source: NBC News
Edward Snowden, in an exclusive interview with "Nightly News" anchor Brian Williams, is fighting back against critics who dismissed him as a low-level hacker — saying he was “trained as a spy” and offered technical expertise to high levels of government.
Snowden defended his expertise in portions of the interview that aired at 6:30 p.m. ET on Nightly News. The extended, wide-ranging interview with Williams, his first with a U.S. television network, airs Wednesday at 10 p.m. ET on NBC.
“I was trained as a spy in sort of the traditional sense of the word, in that I lived and worked undercover overseas — pretending to work in a job that I’m not — and even being assigned a name that was not mine,” Snowden said in the interview.
Snowden described himself as a technical expert who has worked for the United States at high levels, including as a lecturer in a counterintelligence academy for the Defense Intelligence Agency and undercover work for the CIA and National Security Agency.
Read more: http://www.nbcnews.com/feature/edward-snowden-interview/exclusive-edward-snowden-tells-brian-williams-i-was-trained-spy-n115746
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Name: Jesus MalverdeGender: Male
Hometown: SF
Current location: Japan
Member since: Fri May 17, 2013, 10:44 PM
Number of posts: 10,274