fbpx

Gagrule.net

Gagrule.net is a nonpartisan, nonprofit media platform. Our platform is News, Views, Interviews worldwide

US border authority seeks tenders for 30-foot Mexico wall

by

US authorities have posted a call for proposals on two different kinds of wall – one solid concrete, one see-through. It has to look aesthetically pleasing, but only on the American side.

The US-Mexico wall should be 30 feet (9 meters) high, difficult to climb or cut through and look good from the north side, according to US government contract notices.

Two calls for tender were posted by Customs and Border Protection, the Homeland Security Department agency that will oversee the project and eventually patrol and maintain the wall.

The first notice asks for a solid concrete wall, while the other asks for proposals for a “see-through” structure.

Both require the wall to be “physically imposing in height,” ideally 30 feet high – but potentially just 18 feet. Neither should be scalable, even using sophisticated climbing aids, and both should be sunk at least six feet into the ground to avoid tunneling.

They would have to withstand prolonged attacks with “sledgehammer, car jack, pick axe, chisel, battery operated impact tools, battery operated cutting tools, Oxy/acetylene torch or other similar hand-held tools.”

The walls would include 25- and 50-foot automated gates for pedestrians and vehicles.

Pleasing in color’ – on the US side 

Both should be “aesthetically pleasing in color” and texture consistent with the general environment, but only from the north side.

Successful applicants would be asked to build a 30-foot-wide sample wall in San Diego for final selection.

Trump’s new budget proposal included a $2.6 billion down payment for the wall, but the total cost of the project was still unclear.

The Government Accountability Office estimated it would cost about US$6.5 million per mile (3.8 million euros per kilometer) for a pedestrian-proof fence and about $1.8 million a mile for a vehicle barrier. Congressional Republicans said the wall would cost between $12 billion and $15 billion, and Trump suggested $12 billion.

An unnamed government official involved in the project told The Associated Press that an internal report estimated the cost of building a wall along the entire border at about $21 billion.

Mexican firms pull out

Earlier this week, Mexican lawmakers increased pressure on Mexican construction firms tempted to help build the deeply reviled wall.

Senator Gabriela Cuevas of the opposition National Action Party was due to introduce a bill barring the government from doing business with any Mexican firm that participates in the wall’s construction.

Mexican cement giant Cemex back-flipped on comments that it was ready to supply materials for the wall. Its stocks had risen to eight-year highs on speculation that the wall would require US$1 billion of concrete.

Another construction giant, Elementia – partly owned by Mexican billionaire and Trump critic Carlos Slim – said it wants nothing to do with the project.

A company in the central Mexican state of Puebla called Ecovelocity pulled back after initially saying it wanted to install lighting for the wall.

Trump’s insistence that Mexico pay for the wall, together with his attacks on Mexican immigrants as “criminals” and “rapists,” caused a diplomatic row between the two neighbors with Mexican President Enrique Pena Nieto canceling a White House visit in January.

aw/rc (AP, Reuters, AFP)

0

USA: Scores of state lawmakers took trips subsidized by controversial Turkish opposition movement

by

Gulen-schools

Islamic cleric Fethullah Gulen speaks to members of the media at his compound in Saylorsburg, Pa., in 2016. His Hizmet movement helped send at least 151 U.S. state legislators to Turkey, even though the Turkish government now calls him a terrorist.
Chris Post/AP

Gulen groups are connected to U.S. charter school network overseen by legislators

By Liz Essley Whyte

Just why exactly would 151 state legislators from places like Idaho and Texas accept subsidized junkets from a Turkish opposition group now blamed by that country’s government for an attempted coup last summer?

It’s puzzling that state legislators who rarely get involved in foreign policy matters have been courted with international trips.

It’s especially surprising for the invitations to come from a powerful religious movement that until recently ran media outlets and a bank before falling out with the government in Turkey, a pivotal U.S. ally that serves as the gateway to the Middle East. Though followers of the movement deny having supported the failed coup, Turkey has asked the United States to extradite its leader, Fethullah Gulen, a reclusive Islamic cleric who lives in a compound not in Ankara or Istanbul but in the woods of Pennsylvania.

The Center for Public Integrity documented the extent of the trips and found that some state lawmakers who attended them later introduced resolutions supporting Gulen’s controversial Hizmet movement. And some have even supported charter schools that are part of a network from Washington, D.C., to California of roughly 160 taxpayer-funded schools run by friends of the movement.

While some familiar with the lawmakers’ trips frame them as innocuous learning experiences, the trips are meant to transform American community leaders into Gulen sympathizers, according to Joshua Hendrick, a sociologist at Loyola University and a leading expert on the movement.

“It most certainly has the impact of cultivating influence,” Hendrick said. “It is a political effort but it is framed as a grassroots mobilization of dialogue.”

‘Sympathetic to the cause’

The long parade of state legislators who have accepted the heavily subsidized trips from the Gulen movement includes some influential figures. The man known as Illinois’ most powerful state politician, Democratic Speaker of the House Mike Madigan, traveled four times to Turkey on trips sponsored by nonprofit groups associated with Gulen’s Hizmet — or “service” — movement.

In 2011, at least a tenth of Idaho’s state legislators toured the land of the Ottomans on the movement’s dime.

At least four Texas lawmakers who have served on legislative education committees went on the sponsored trips. The Lone Star state is home to the most Gulen-linked charter schools.

California has about a dozen of the schools, as do Florida and Ohio. Arizona, Illinois and Missouri are among the states that have them, as well.

The Center for Public Integrity used lawmakers’ annual disclosures and news reports to identify 151 state legislators from 29 states who toured Turkey between 2006 and 2015 thanks to more than two dozen nonprofits associated with the Gulen movement.

Among those who went on the trips were lawmakers who had rarely traveled overseas. Many had little knowledge of Gulen or Turkish politics. Few of their states have trade connections to Turkey.

But state legislators represent the political farm team of leaders who may someday play in the big leagues of Congress or beyond. Thom Tillis, for one, was first elected to the North Carolina statehouse in 2006 and went on a trip to Turkey with a Gulen movement group in 2011. Fast forward: The Republican is now a U.S. senator serving on the powerful Armed Services Committee, which oversees members of the U.S. military stationed in Turkey.

State lawmakers also shape education policy and hold the purse strings on state budgets, which fund charter schools.

“It’s effective public relations,” said William Martin, a Rice University sociologist who went on two sponsored trips. “That can affect their schools, it can affect the things they would like to do.”

The schools have denied connections to Gulen, but experts and even some friends of the movement call the links obvious. The charter schools are often founded and run by individuals with long ties to the Gulen movement, and they frequently hire Turkish teachers, sponsor their visas and move them between schools.  Many were set up with the help of nonprofits tied to the movement.

Gulen supporters say the trips for lawmakers promoted intercultural dialogue, a key component of Gulen’s teaching. The former imam preaches a unique brand of Islamic mysticism paired with Turkish nationalism and respect for modern science.

“We wanted to act as a kind of a bridge” between Americans and Turks, said Atilla Kahveci, vice president of the California-based Pacifica Institute, a Gulen-movement group that has organized lawmaker trips. “We didn’t have any kind of, from our point of view, ulterior agenda, no matter how it seems from outside.”

But other experts think the trips have political motivations.

“It’s like any other lobbying or political operation,” said James Jeffrey, who served as ambassador to Turkey under President George W. Bush and is now a fellow at the Washington Institute for Near East Policy, a think tank. “They’re doing this to advance their cause.”

American sympathizers have stuck up for Gulen and his followers. Since 2011, state lawmakers in 23 states have introduced at least 54 resolutions honoring Turkey or Turkish Americans, some of which specifically praised Gulen or Gulen-movement organizations, according to a Center for Public Integrity analysis of data from Quorum, a legislative tracking service.

For example, the Illinois House of Representatives passed a resolution in 2011 recognizing Gulen for his “inspirational contributions to the promotion of global peace and understanding.” A Gulen-movement group sponsored at least 32 trips to Turkey for Illinois state lawmakers between 2008 and 2012, according to the Chicago Sun-Times.

In Kansas, former state Rep. Tom Moxley, a Republican who went on a subsidized trip to Turkey in 2011, sponsored a resolution the following year that praised Turkey’s diversity and called for the creation of a Kansan-Turkish Friendship Network.

“I’m more sympathetic to the cause, the belief system of this group of Muslims, versus the ones that are in power in Turkey today,” he said. “We’re watching a dictator take over at a time when the American government can least afford to lose them as a friend.”

Source: https://www.publicintegrity.org/2017/02/09/20657/scores-state-lawmakers-took-trips-subsidized-controversial-turkish-opposition?utm_campaign=key-findings&utm_source=publici_website&utm_medium=twitter

 

0

Erdogan hypocrisy from shooting down Russian Jet to asking Russian Air support

by

Authentic Turkish Crime, your friend today your enemy tomorrow.

Turkey has declined the US military’s offer to provide air support for its troops in Syria, asking Russia to take on the role instead, American officials say.

Two US military officials said that Ankara, which has been fighting militants inside the Syrian territories, has accepted air power from Moscow over the past few days, the NBC News reported Wednesday.

This is while, the Turks have turned down the US-led coalition’s help, the officials claimed.

Back in August, Turkey launched an incursion into Syria, claiming that the military operation was meant to engage both Daesh terrorists in the Syrian-Turkish border area and Kurdish forces, who were themselves fighting Daesh.

Damascus has on multiple occasions condemned Ankara’s intervention as a breach of its sovereignty.

In December, Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan stressed that the US had failed to keep its promise of air support in Ankara’s operations in the Arab country, mainly in the city of al-Bab, which has proven a tough battle for the Turks.

“Even though the US-led coalition has failed to keep its promises [pledging air support] in our operation to liberate al-Bab, we will rid the city of Daesh terrorists, no matter what,” Erdogan said back then.

The complaints continued on Wednesday, with Turkish Defense Minister Fikri Isik saying that he lack of US air support was fueling negative public sentiments over Washington’s use of Turkey’s Incirlik airbase.

This is while the American military forces have conducted flights over the city as a show of force without dropping any bombs.

According to NBC, when one of the military officials was asked whether Russia was pounding Daesh in the city, he said “for now they are.”

Al-Bab sits between Aleppo and Manbij, the city that was liberated last year with help from the US-backed Kurdish People’s Protection Units (YPG).

Turkey is said to be among the main supporters of militant groups in Syria and stands accused of training and arming Takfiri elements, facilitating their passage into the violence-wracked country, and buying smuggled oil from militants.

0

History of American Thanksgiving

by

thanksgiving(history.com) In 1621, the Plymouth colonists and Wampanoag Indians shared an autumn harvest feast that is acknowledged today as one of the first Thanksgiving celebrations in the colonies. For more than two centuries, days of thanksgiving were celebrated by individual colonies and states. It wasn’t until 1863, in the midst of the Civil War, that President Abraham Lincoln proclaimed a national Thanksgiving Day to be held each November.

In September 1620, a small ship called the Mayflower left Plymouth, England, carrying 102 passengers—an assortment of religious separatists seeking a new home where they could freely practice their faith and other individuals lured by the promise of prosperity and land ownership in the New World. After a treacherous and uncomfortable crossing that lasted 66 days, they dropped anchor near the tip of Cape Cod, far north of their intended destination at the mouth of the Hudson River. One month later, the Mayflower crossed Massachusetts Bay, where the Pilgrims, as they are now commonly known, began the work of establishing a village at Plymouth.

Throughout that first brutal winter, most of the colonists remained on board the ship, where they suffered from exposure, scurvy and outbreaks of contagious disease. Only half of the Mayflower’s original passengers and crew lived to see their first New England spring. In March, the remaining settlers moved ashore, where they received an astonishing visit from an Abenaki Indian who greeted them in English. Several days later, he returned with another Native American, Squanto, a member of the Pawtuxet tribe who had been kidnapped by an English sea captain and sold into slavery before escaping to London and returning to his homeland on an exploratory expedition. Squanto taught the Pilgrims, weakened by malnutrition and illness, how to cultivate corn, extract sap from maple trees, catch fish in the rivers and avoid poisonous plants. He also helped the settlers forge an alliance with the Wampanoag, a local tribe, which would endure for more than 50 years and tragically remains one of the sole examples of harmony between European colonists and Native Americans.

Read More: http://www.history.com/topics/thanksgiving/history-of-thanksgiving

0

Armenian National Committee of America ANCA Calls for Forceful U.S. Response to Turkey’s HDP Arrests

by

anc-protest-hdp-arrest

ANCA leads community effort calling on U.S. to forcefully condemn the Turkish Government’s latest crackdown on the HDP party.

ANCA Launches Online Action Portal – anca.org/hdp – calling on Secretary Kerry Condemn Erdogan’s Crackdown

WASHINGTON—In the wake of the November 3rd Turkish government crackdown on the pro-democracy HDP party, the Armenian National Committee of America (ANCA) has registered protests with the U.S. government and launched a nationwide grassroots advocacy campaign calling Secretary of State John Kerry to respond forcefully against Turkish President Recep Erdogan’s attempt to silence the last remaining major pro-democracy voice left in Turkey.

An ANCA action alert – www.anca.org/HDP – provides supporters of a democratic Turkey with the opportunity to ask Secretary Kerry to condemn Ankara’s crackdown and demand the immediate release of imprisoned HDP leaders.  The letter reads, in part: “My request is as simple as it is straightforward: The United States must publicly and forcefully protest Turkey’s crackdown and demand the immediate release of all those imprisoned by the Erdogan regime.”

Commenting on the campaign, ANCA Executive Director Aram Hamparian stressed that “We must break with the failed policies of appeasement that have, for far too long, misguided American policy toward Turkey, allowing Turkish leader and their army of lobbyists to compromise both our country’s interests and our nation’s values.”

Earlier on Friday, ANCA leaders and activists joined with Kurdish Americans and other committed to democracy within Turkey in a protest outside the Turkish Embassy. The demonstration was covered by Armenian, Kurdish, and Turkish media.

0

Gagrule Video Who is Turkish Imam Fethullah Gülen, Who support him, how he recruits U.S. charter schools

by

turkish bloody history Gulen

Turkey coup: What is Gulen movement and what does it want?

Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan blames US-based cleric Fethullah Gulen for last week’s bloody attempted coup.

Suspected Gulenists are now being purged in their thousands in a wave of arrests and sackings and Mr Erdogan has declared a state of emergency.

But what do we know about the movement, and what does it want?

Gulenists incessantly advertise Bill Clinton’s speech at the Third Annual Friendship Dinner organized by the Turkish Cultural Center of New York (a Gulenist organization) at the Waldorf Astoria on September 25, 2008.  The video of Clinton’s brief speech has been publicized on the internet by several Gulenist organizations,

and has become one of the Gulenists’ favorite defense weapons.  Whenever anything critical of the Gulen Movement or Gulen charter schools has appeared in the press, Gulenists have touted this speech as a full-fledged endorsement that they insist must instantly dispel any doubts ever raised about Fethullah Gulen and his followers.  The weight that Gulenists put on this speech seems quite out of proportion to its actual content; Clinton mentions Gulen only once in the entire speech, and never praises him directly.

0

USA: FAA Bans All Flights Between US and Turkey Indefinitely

by

FAA ban flightUSA The Federal Aviation Administration has banned all flights between the United States and airports in Turkey.

The indefinite ban took effect on Saturday in the wake of the failed coup attempt in Turkey that left 265 dead and over 2,000 injured.

“The FAA is monitoring the situation in Turkey in coordination with the State Department and the Department of Homeland Security and will update the restrictions as the situation evolves,” the agency said in a statement.

The US embassy in Ankara issued a statement Saturday warning that US government officials have been told not to use the airport in Istanbul and that US citizens in the country should continue to seek shelter despite Turkey’s claim that they have completely neutralized the attempted coup.

Meanwhile, the Pentagon says that US warplanes have stopped flying missions against Daesh in Syria and Iraq from the Incirlik air base in southern Turkey after the government closed its airspace to military aircraft.

Pentagon press secretary, Peter Cook, said Saturday that US officials are working with Turkish officials to get permission to resume air operations as soon as possible following the attempted coup.

Cook acknowledged that US Central Command was forced to adjust flight operations in the anti-Daesh effort to minimize the effect of the Turkish airspace closure.

US authorities are also blocking access on and off the Incirlik air base where American nuclear weapons stockpiles are stored until the security situation subsides.

source: http://sputniknews.com/middleeast/20160717/1043140643/faa-erdogan-obama-ankara-washington.html

0

Prospect of Direct Flights between Armenia and U.S. Assessed

by

Direct flightYEREVAN (Armenpress)—Direct flights between Armenia and the US should be based on economic and business factors, said Bridget Brink, U.S. State Department Deputy Assistant Secretary in the Bureau of European and Eurasian Affairs.

Asked to comment on the Open Sky policy of the Republic of Armenia and the perspectives of direct flight between Armenia and the US, Brink noted “I can say I would love to see that possibility. It’s going to be a commercial business decision. And I really applaud the reforms that have been done so far to do the Open Skies treaty and agreement. And that, I know, has opened up possibilities for more flights to and from Armenia.”

“So as Armenia’s economy grows, as the tourist business grows, if Armenia becomes this hub of the region — which would be fantastic — and if some of these things that are, right now, potential barriers including issues like corruption, judicial independence, finding a resolution to regional protracted conflicts – I think the sky is the limit. So we strongly support it in terms of having more options in Armenia. And we’ll do what we can as a government,” Brink said.

Regarding the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict, Brink stated that “The U.S. supports the agreements on the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict reached during Vienna and Saint Petersburg meetings and does everything for the comprehensive settlement of the conflict.”

“We are trying to be supportive both through co-Chairs and my Secretary of State and we strongly support moving forward the few agreements from the May meeting in Vienna and the June meeting in Saint Petersburg to move forward in both of those confidence building measures and also discussion on a comprehensive settlement,” noted the State Department official.

Brink also stressed that the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict hinders the ability for Armenia to fully take advantage of its geographic location.

“Resolution to that [NK conflict] has great potential to Armenia’s economic growth and strength. Because it could open up pathways, both geographic pathways and other connections which could help this whole region,” she said.

“We strongly support economic development, both in Armenia and also regionally. I mean, Armenia is very importantly located in a region that is a crossroads, from the East to the West. And developing that as a possible crossroads for goods, people, services, is very important,” said the State Department official.

0

President Obama & Turkish Dictator Erdogan Next Week Will Open The Largest Turkish Mosque In The World in USA

by

Obama Erdogan opning mosqueby Walid Shoebat on March 25, 2016,

America’s largest mosque complex, officially known as Turkish-American Culture and Civilization Center, was built with Turkish funding under the supervision of the Turkish religious foundation (Diyanet). The $100 million mega mosque in Lanham, Maryland, will soon be open for Muslim worshipers in the Washington, DC area, as their link shows: “Turkey’s President Tayyip Erdoğan and US President Barack Obama are expected to open the mosque.”

I guess you can learn about  president’s next step towards building Islam in the U.S., not from your media, but from Erdogan’s official media Yeni Safak instead,

Do you see “US Double Minaret Mosque” above in the article Erdogan published? Why “Two Minarets”?

An Ottoman sultan is addressed as such in prayer: “O God, assist the Sultan, son of the Sultan, Sovereign of the Two Continents, of the Two Seas, Destroyer of Two Armies, Sultan of the Two Iraqs, Servant of the Two Sanctuaries [Mecca and Medina]” (Ibn Iyas, 195-1960). Muhammad II was “Sovereign of the Two Seas, the Black Sea and the Mediterranean.”

Turkey is an empire that will arise TWICE, once after it is wounded and another for its glory.

Even Daniel the prophet recognizes this feature, Antichrist loves to have his established castles between the “two seas”:

“And he shall plant the tabernacles of his palace between the [two] seas in the glorious holy mountain; yet he shall come to his end, and none shall help him.” (Daniel 11:45)

Will the West ever awake its slumber and learn just how packed each verse is in the scriptures?

The $100 million mega-mosque in Maryland, US will soon be open in the Washington, DC area, as Turkey’s President Tayyip Erdoğan is expected to open the mosque during his official visit to the US between March 29 and April 2.

America’s largest mosque complex, officially known as the Turkish-American Culture and Civilization Center, was built with Turkish funding under the supervision of the Turkish religious foundation (Diyanet).

Almost all $100 million for the mosque was funded by the Religious Affairs and the Religious Foundation of Turkey.

The mosque is part of the Turkish-Islamic Center also known as the “American Religious Center,” built on a large area in Lanham, Maryland that will have the capacity to host 3,000 Muslim worshippers indoors and outdoors.

Turkey builds $100 million mega mosque in Maryland, US will include a community building, a guest house, traditional Turkish houses, library, conference and exhibition halls, meeting rooms, reception, museum of Islamic art, coffee house, gift shops, cultural center, amphitheater, computer lab, library and even Turkish baths in the old Ottoman style … the works. It “aims at bringing all Muslims together, to enlighten people about the facts of Islam and guide believers to a correct way” says Yeni Safak.

And these projects are not only in Maryland (keep in mind, it was called Maryland, as in the Land of Mary for Catholics), in Dayton you have some really excited stupid Americans there as well who enjoyed another mosque there too, courtesy of Antichrist Erdogan.

Believe it or not, the Turkish religious authority had had 200,267 meetings, conferences, panels and symposiums, all organized solely in the northern parts of the globe as an objective to influence non-Arab Muslim countries, especially in the Balkans. To Turkey Central Asia’s C.I.S nations (Uzbekistan, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan)  is the goal of this anti-Christ agenda and Turkey today takes the lead in what the Bible prophecies Antichrist will do in  the region of Meshech, Tubal, Gomer and Beth Togarmah.

You said in your heart, ‘I will ascend to heaven; above the stars of God I will set my throne on high; I will sit on the mount of assembly in the far reaches of the north (Isaiah 14:13)

A state-sponsored program to build mosques in countries from Kazakhstan to Cuba has emerged as a foreign policy instrument for Turkey, boosting the country’s claim to a place on the international stage as a leader of the Islamic world that looks after Muslims everywhere.

Read more on: http://shoebat.com/2016/03/25/president-obama-next-week-will-open-the-largest-american-mosque-in-the-world-built-here-in-the-u-s-he-will-be-accompanied-by-antichrist-erdogan-of-turkey-and-together-will-enjoy-the-sounds-of-allahu/

 

0