Author: Steven Sahiounie

By Sarah Abed On Saturday, Turkey’s President Recep Tayyip Erdogan announced that preparations have been made for a unilateral cross border air and land military operation in the next day or two, in northern Syria, east of the Euphrates River. Erdogan expressed his frustration with Washington’s lack of adherence to a September 30th deadline to establish a thirty-kilometer-deep safe zone on Syria’s northern border. In response to Erdogan’s threat, the US-backed Kurdish militia group known as The Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) stated that they are ready to respond to an unprovoked Turkish attack with an all-out war if necessary. Sandwiched between the Turkish-backed Free Syrian…

Steven Sahiounie, Middle East observer President Trump will save the American taxpayer millions of dollars in a surprising reversal of US foreign, and military policy in northeastern Syria.   In a White House statement delivered late Sunday night by Stephanie Grisham, “Turkey will soon be moving forward with its long-planned operation into Northern Syria. The United States Armed Forces will not support or be involved in the operation, and United States forces, having defeated the ISIS territorial ‘Caliphate,’ will no longer be in the immediate area.” In his newest flop-flop, Trump has given Turkey the green light to invade northeastern…

An official from Iran’s Ministry of Energy has said that the country would launch new power plants with more than 3,800 megawatts (MW) of capacity until next summer. “Based on the devised plans, 3,864 MW of new power plants will be connected to the country’s national electricity grid before the peak of the next summer,” said Mohsen Tarztalab on Sunday. The announcement means that Iran could add some 34 terawatt hours (TWh) of electricity to its current production of above 300 TWh as authorities seek to both increase exports to neighboring countries and increase stability of the domestic network over…

The Saudi announcement comes on the heels of French President Emmanuel Macron’s statement on Monday at a joint press conference with the Sudanese prime minister. Macron said that France would work on convincing the United States to remove Sudan from the list of state sponsors of terrorism. Saudi Arabia is undertaking efforts to remove Sudan from the US terrorism list, according to a publication posted on the Saudi Foreign Ministry’s Twitter page. The statement comes as President of the Sudanese Sovereignty Council Abdel Fattah al-Burhan and Prime Minister Abdullah Hamdok arrived in Riyadh. The Sudanese officials have embarked on their…

Iraqi officials have insisted that government forces did not fire directly at protesters during a brutal crackdown on anti-government demonstrations which has left at least 104 people dead and thousands more injured. Security forces have repeatedly used live ammunition in a bid to clamp down on the wave of protests that have swept across Iraq this week. However, Interior Ministry spokesman Major General Saad Maan insisted on Sunday that government forces did not shoot directly at protesting civilians. In a news conference broadcast on state television, Maan said that eight members of the security forces died in the violent clashes…

The 2011 NATO intervention in Libya, which helped topple the government of Muammar Gaddafi, was done to put an end to his attempts to stop foreign exploitation of the continent, the strongman’s wartime spokesman told RT. The bombing campaign, which propped up rebel forces and ultimately led to the summary execution of Gaddafi, was justified by reports of various crimes of its government. Those were later proven to be completely false or largely exaggerated, said Moussa Ibrahim, who served as Gaddafi’s spokesman at the time. In reality NATO bombed Libya not to stop Viagra-assisted mass rapes of women by government loyalists.…

Tunisian presidential front-runner Kais Saied has boycotted the country’s parliamentary election, according to an electoral campaign organiser on Sunday. “Saied has decided to boycott the polls,” Sami al-Aydi told Anadolu Agency. He argued that the presidential candidate opposes holding the parliamentary election on the closed-list electoral system. Saied, a former law professor, secured 18.4% of votes in the first round of presidential election held three week ago, followed by media mogul Nabil Karoui, who won 15.6% of votes. A runoff vote will be held on October 13. Tunisians headed to polls on Sunday to elect their representatives in the parliament. It is the…

Yemeni sources revealed on Friday that pro-UAE militias attempted a coup in the archipelago of Socotra, the largest island in the east of the country, following the dismissal of a security official. Concurrently, the Arab Coalition accused the Houthi group of firing two ballistic missiles, despite the declared truce with Saudi Arabia. Sources close to the government told Al-Araby Al-Jadeed that on Friday, militias belonging to the so-called Southern Transitional Council carried out an attempt to take control over security headquarters in the governorate, including breaking into the headquarters of the rescue police and looting its contents. The sources pointed out that the movements in Socotra…

Masked gunmen have ransacked the offices of multiple television stations in Baghdad, as the death toll following days of civil unrest continues to climb. The Saudi-owned Al-Arabiya said that carloads of gunmen arrived at its offices on Saturday evening, ransacked the building and beat up employees who fled. The offices of Dijla, NRT, Arabiya Hadath, Fallouja, Alghad Alaraby, Al-Sharqiya and Sky News Arabia were also reportedly targeted. Among the networks targeted were Kurdish, Jordanian, international and locally-owned outlets. The identity of the attackers is unknown, though NRT claimed that they belonged to “security forces.” On the other hand, Al-Arabiya claimed that the…

By Drago Bosnic  TEHRAN – Iranian Deputy Defense Minister Brigadier General Qassem Taqizadeh said the US has stopped flights of its U-2 reconnaissance planes over the region for fear of being intercepted by Iran’s increasingly effective air defense system. “The US moves in the region are monitored every hour and for instance, the flights of the US U-2 planes which took off from Cyprus and flew twice over the region stopped after Iran made and operated Bavar 373 air defense system and after they found out that the system can track and destroy them (the U-2 planes),” General Taqizadeh said, addressing a ceremony…