The Prophecy is much more than seeing into the future. For the Prophecy sees without the element of time. For the Prophecy sees what is, what was, and what always shall be. 11:11 LLC
The United States Geological Survey says the 3.3 magnitude quake hit several mikes south of the town of Ormstown, Quebec a little after 5:30 A.M. There are some slightly conflicting reports, as the Montreal Gazette reports that the quake was a 3.6 magnitude. Ormstown is located around 20 minutes north of the New York border.
The Times Union says the quake was felt as far south as the town of Ticonderoga in Essex County, and as far west as the city of Ogdensburg on the New York-Ontario border. The effects were also felt as far north as Montreal.
Some strike even closer to home. In April 2017, a 1.3 tremor occurred around two and half miles west of Pawling. In early 2016, an even smaller quake happened near Port Chester and Greenwich, CT. In the summer of 2019, a quake struck off the New Jersey coast.
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FILE – In this photo released by the Atomic Energy Organization of Iran, technicians work at the Arak heavy water reactor’s secondary circuit, as officials and media visit the site, near Arak, 150 miles (250 kilometers) southwest of the capital Tehran, Iran, Dec. 23, 2019. Iranian officials now speak openly about something long denied by Tehran as it enriches uranium at its closest-ever levels to weapons-grade material: Iran is ready to build an atomic weapon at will. (Atomic Energy Organization of Iran via AP, File)
Meanwhile, proliferation is continuing in North Korea and Iran without any impediments. Iran reportedly possesses enough enriched uranium to build several nuclear weapons. North Korea, according to most estimates, has approximately 40-60 nuclear weapons and is busily building a submarine-launched ballistic missile (SLBM) and shorter-range tactical nuclear missiles. As a result, North Korea is increasingly able to threaten the continental U.S., South Korea and Japan, despite 30 years of Western efforts to prevent Pyongyang from obtaining these weapons and capabilities. Both these states can point to Ukraine, as well as Libya and Iraq’s fate, as exemplifying what happens when a country voluntarily renounces nuclear weapons.
These trends, in turn, are already generating counter-pressures among neighbors to emulate the example and also go nuclear. Saudi Arabia’s flirtation with nuclear weapons has long been known, and should Iran openly achieve nuclear weapon status, it may well follow suit. Similarly, thanks to North Korea’s nuclearization, unceasing missile tests and Putin’s nuclear saber-rattling, South Korean public opinion in favor of nuclearization has “exploded” in the last year.
It would be much better if these nuclear malefactors followed a different example, namely that of Kazakhstan, which renounced nuclear weapons and pioneered in persuading its Central Asian neighbors to agree to create a nuclear weapon-free zone. As a result, Kazakhstan has actually strengthened its security, international standing and economic prospects — something that Iran and North Korea have signally failed to do and show little interest in pursuing. Guided by the vision of its founding president, Nursultan Nazarbayev, and chastened by the recognition of the catastrophic consequences of Soviet nuclear testing in the country, upon becoming independent, Kazakhstan repudiated nuclear weapons and testing.
This far-sighted and enlightened decision established at a single stroke Kazakhstan’s respectability and credibility, enhanced its security and international standing and laid the groundwork for its attractiveness as a global ally to other governments and international organizations. Those outcomes also contributed in no small measure to it becoming a magnet for foreign investment.
As a result of these policies, Northeast Asia and the Middle East are two of the most dangerous regions in the world today, while Central Asia, though it faces the threat of Islamic terrorism from Afghanistan and serious environmental challenges, is much calmer than anyone would have expected 30 years ago when those states became independent. This outcome owes much to Nazarbayev’s vision and statesmanship.
But the importance of the Kazakh example does not end here. Nazarbayev’s legacy provides a basis for progress because it shows aspirants to nuclear weapons that, rather than trying to intimidate their neighbors and interlocutors, there is an alternative path to security, status and even the possibility of prosperity. Also, it is not only the states pursuing nuclear weapons that are insecure. The obsession with insecurity seems to make neighbors just as insecure, whether it’s Ukraine in Russia’s case, Japan and South Korea in North Korea’s case, or all of the Middle East in Iran’s case. The progressive-left mob has come for Daniel PennyLawmakers will forgive the nation’s debt and student debt, but what about debt among the incarcerated?
For this and many other reasons, we must continue to champion the cause of nonproliferation. Doing so works to remove one of the major factors for the perpetual uncertainty that afflicts too many regions of the world today, and even leads states to believe they can launch wars with impunity.
Nazarbayev grasped that trying to possess nuclear weapons neither benefitted Kazakhstan nor enhanced its security. Nonproliferation can give Northeast Asia and the Middle East infinitely more than nuclear weapons can offer. We must continue to champion Nazarbayev’s insight to reverse the trend toward nuclearization, and with it, the trend toward war.
Stephen Blank, Ph.D., is a senior fellow at the Foreign Policy Research Institute (FPRI). He is a former professor of Russian national security studies and national security affairs at the Strategic Studies Institute of the U.S. Army War College and a former MacArthur fellow at the U.S. Army War College. Blank is an independent consultant focused on the geopolitics and geostrategy of the former Soviet Union, Russia and Eurasia.
The quake was recorded in Westchester County, New York, around the Hastings-On-Hudson and Yonkers area, according to the USGS, an uncommon occurrence in nation’s most populated metro area.
Hastings-On-Hudson is a small village less than 20 miles north of Manhattan.
Major earthquakes are rare in the New York City area. The last shake to measure a magnitude of 5.0 or more in the region was an 1884 earthquake that toppled chimneys, according to Columbia University.
G7 leaders adopted a statement on Ukraine at the Hiroshima summit, supporting the IAEA’s efforts to resolve the situation around the Zaporizhzhia NPP and calling Russia’s actions to militarize the nuclear plant “irresponsible”.
“We express our gravest concern over Russia’s grossly irresponsible seizure and militarization of the Zaporizhzhya Nuclear Power Plant (ZNPP). We support the International Atomic Energy Agency’s (IAEA) efforts to strengthen nuclear safety and security of, and the application of safeguards to, nuclear material and facilities in Ukraine, including through the continuous presence of IAEA experts and its focus on ensuring nuclear safety and security at the site,” reads G7 Leaders’ Statement on Ukraine released today.
G7 leaders reaffirmed support for the IAEA Director General’s “Seven Indispensable Pillars of Nuclear Safety and Nuclear Security” and highlighted the importance of ensuring and promoting the safety and security of nuclear facilities under any circumstances. In this context, the leaders highlighted the G7’s contribution to the IAEA’s efforts in Ukraine for this purpose and called on others to provide support.
As reported, the 48th G7 Summit began today in Hiroshima, Japan, and will continue until May 21. The main topic of the meeting was determined by the Japanese G7 presidency to ensure the stability of the global economy in the context of the consequences of the coronavirus pandemic and Russian aggression against Ukraine.
One of the main priorities of the meeting is the continuation of assistance to Ukraine in its defense against Russian aggression.
He’s not a general and he’s not a politician, at least in the conventional sense. But with a single speech he can spark a protest that ends up in with hundreds of Iraqi Shiites storming their parliament. He’s commanded a militia of thousands, some who fought and killed U.S. and Iraqi soldiers. And he’s been on TIME Magazine’s annual list of the 100 most influential people on the planet.
This is how he’s managed to gain such prominence — and retain it.
The Sadr family
Sadr was born in 1973 in the Shiite holy city of Najaf to a prominent family.
The city, which is about 100 miles south of Baghdad, is home to the Imam Ali shrine, where the eponymous cousin and son-in-law of the prophet Muhammad is buried. Shiites believe that Ali was the rightful successor to Muhammad.
Sadr’s father, Ayatollah Muhammad Sadiq al-Sadr, was an important Shiite figure in Iraq who openly spoke out against Saddam Hussein and his ruling Baath party.
The elder Sadr and two of his sons were assassinated in 1999 in Najaf, and many believe that he was killed either by the dictator’s forces or Sunnis loyal to him.
Despite the cult of personality Muqtada al-Sadr has developed in recent years, he is still a relatively private man. He does not appear in public often and his exact age was not known until recently.
Protesters in Kadhimiya, Iraq, hold up pictures of Ayatollah Muhammad Sadiq al-Sadr, Muqtada al-Sadr’s father.
The Mehdi Army
Sadr is best known to Western audiences for his role leading the Mehdi Army, which he formed in 2003 during the U.S. invasion of Iraq.
The militia is considered the armed wing of the Sadrist movement, which followed the teachings of Sadr’s father. Its power base was in Najaf and the massive Sadr City in eastern Baghdad, which is home to more than 2 million Shias.
Sadr himself opposed the presence of outside forces in Iraq — be they al Qaeda’s Sunni fighters or U.S. forces — and hoped to establish Islamic rule within the country, clashing with the Iraqi Army, U.S. forces and fellow Shias.
By 2004, forces loyal to Sadr battled the U.S. for control of Najaf. President George W. Bush labeled him an enemy and ordered the U.S. military to take him out.
“We can’t allow one man to change the course of the country,” he said, according to Lt. Gen. Ricardo Sanchez.
Within a week, Bush changed course and decided not to go after him.
“That reversal was the turning point in al-Sadr’s rise to power,” Sanchez, who commanded U.S. forces in Iraq from 2003 to 2004, said. “It gave him legitimacy and enhanced his stature within the broader Iraqi community.”
Later that year, Sadr made peace with the most powerful Shia religious figure in Iraq, Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani, who brokered a truce between U.S. forces and the Mehdi Army. The deal brought together the unquestioned spiritual leader of Iraq’s Shia population and the man who could mobilize the Shia “street.”
The Mehdi Army in Najaf in 2007.
As part of the agreement, the Iraqi government agreed not to press charges after a judge issued an arrest warrant for Sadr in connection with the killing of another prominent Shia leader, Ayatollah Abdul Majid al-Khoei.
But the Mehdi Army became even more deadly as the war dragged on.
The militia was linked to much of the sectarian violence that reached fever pitch in Iraq in 2006 and 2007. It was accused of running death squads, killing Sunni Arabs and fighting with rival Shiite factions, though Sadr would denounce the violence from time to time.
After more than 200 people were killed in an attack on Sadr City in 2006 — one of the deadliest periods in the Iraq war — Shiite militants responded by burning people to death and attacking Sunni mosques.
By the end of the year, Pentagon leaders assessed that the Mehdi army had replaced al Qaeda as “the most dangerous accelerant” of sectarian violence in Iraq.
But the Mehdi Army also clashed with other Shiite militias. The group often clashed with Badr Brigades for control of parts of Iraq’s Shiite-dominate south. At one point the Badr Brigades partnered with Iraqi security forces to fight the Mehdi Army.
However, the Mehdi Army’s power and influence began to subside by the end of 2007, in part due to the U.S. troop surge.
Kingmaker
Sadr’s capacity to reinvent his role in Iraqi politics, and to tap into a strong vein of Shia protest, has helped him survive and outmaneuver many rivals over the past 13 years. His latest initiative reinforces his place as one of the most influential figures in Iraq.
He and the Iraqi government signed a ceasefire in 2008, and later that year he formally disbanded the Mehdi Army.
The organization is now called Saraya al-Salam, which means the Peace Brigades.
His plan was to transition it into a socio-political populist movement to help Iraq’s poor Shiites through a combination of political and grassroots activities — following a similar model to the structure of Hezbollah in Lebanon.
Sadr would move to Iran later that year for religious study. Some believed that he hoped to achieve a higher religious standing, like Hezbollah’s Hassan Nasrallah, in order to strengthen his leadership position.
Muqtada al-Sadr delivers a speech in Najaf in 2011.
He returned to Iraq permanently in 2011 — more than three years later — without a new title, but with ambitions to become an Iraqi nationalist leader who could make a difference by growing his movement and pushing his followers to the ballot box.
“We have not forgotten the occupier. We remain a resistance,” he said in one of his first speeches back. Sadr did strike a conciliatory tone with fellow Iraqis: “Whatever struggle happened between brothers, let us forget about it and turn the page forever and live united,” he said. “We do not kill an Iraqi.”
Though Sadr rarely makes public appearances, his plan seems to have worked so far.
During Iraq’s 2010 elections, his supporters were key to helping then-Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki secure a second term; today they make up the second-largest bloc in Iraq’s Parliament.
Muqtada al-Sadr and former Iraqi Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki in 2006.
But Sadr and Maliki have since had a nasty falling out, and now are considered rivals in Baghdad.
After the 2010 election, Sadr referred to Maliki as a “dictator.”
He often called for the government to better include moderate Sunni elements, a faction that most say was marginalized by the Maliki government, which led to his ouster (and in part contributed to the rise of ISIS).
His support for Iraq’s current Prime Minster, Haider al-Abadi, is lukewarm at best.
Sadr is now focusing his efforts on reshaping Iraq’s government — he wants more technocrats appointed and to go after corrupt politicians.
Sadr’s supporters held massive protests earlier this year to push Abadi to form a new government and enact reforms. The demonstrations were called off after Abadi trimmed the size of his Cabinet and submitted a new list of nonpolitical ministers for approval by parliament.
And it was Sadr’s impassioned speech late April that spurred protesters to occupy the Iraqi Parliament and Baghdad’s Green Zone, a normally off-limits area housing government buildings and foreign embassies.
CNN’s Tim Lister, Hamdi Alkhshali, Mohammed Tawfeeq and Elise Labott contributed to this report
Minor earthquake shakes residents near New York City
A 2.2 magnitude impacted the New York metro area around 1:50 a.m., according to the United States Geological Service.
A small earthquake shook buildings across the New York metropolitan area Friday morning.
A 2.2 magnitude impacted the New York metropolitan area around 1:50 a.m., according to the United States Geological Service.
The tremor struck south of Hastings-on-Hudson, a village in Westchester County about 10 miles north of New York City. There were no initial reports of damage or injuries from the seismic activity.
Residents in New York and New Jersey described the quake’s impact as dramatic and noticeable, though it did not cause any damage.
Yonkers, NY, resident Sophia Balaj told ABC News that the quake produced a loud rumble for a few seconds, noticeable enough to prompt all the members of the video call she was on to ask each other if they felt the same shaking.
Englewood, NJ, resident Erica Diggs, a military veteran who completed two deployments to Iraq, compared the feeling of the earthquake to a mortar.
“What it felt like was a mortar, and what it sounded like was a mortar.” She later added the quake “gave me flashbacks of being in my trailer when I was in Iraq and the mortars would hit that close.”
“I was like, ‘That’s not wind,’” she told ABC News. “And then I thought, oh my god, is there a bomb explosion nearby?”
Like Solin, many residents near New York City took to social media early Friday morning to ask if others had felt a similar shake.
Earthquakes near New York City are relatively uncommon, though the occasional tremor has impacted the region.
A 5.8 earthquake struck Virginia in 2011, sending noticeable tremors up the eastern seaboard, including New York City. Another 3.9 magnitude earthquake in 2010 off the coast of Southampton caused similar alarm for residents in New York.
The gathering will take place in Hiroshima, the site of the first atomic attack in 1945 and which has since become a symbol of global peace.
But with North Korea and Russia making nuclear threats, and China growing its arsenal, there may be little appetite for bold action on Prime Minister Fumio Kishida’s stated goal of a “world free of nuclear weapons”.
As it stands, there are nine countries that possess nuclear weapons: Russia, the US, Britain, France, India, Pakistan, China, North Korea and Israel.
Observers have warned that the proliferation of nuclear weapons is growing, not easing, amid an increasingly unstable geopolitical climate.
The US Department of Defence said in a report last year that China’s nuclear warhead supply has surpassed 400 and it is on a path for about 1,500 warheads by 2035.
Iran has been accused of attempting to enrich uranium to advance its own clandestine nuclear weapons programme, but the prospect of a nuclear-armed Tehran remains years away.
Most of the thousands of nuclear weapons in the world are in the nuclear arsenals of the US and Russia.
Nuclear-armed states have 12,700 nuclear warheads, of which 9,400 are in active military stockpiles.
This is far fewer than the estimated 70,000 during the height of the Cold War.
However, nuclear arsenals are expected to grow over the coming decade and today’s weapons are vastly more capable than those used against Japan in the Second World War.
Perhaps the most famous treaty covering nuclear weapons is the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty, which opened for signatures in 1968.
A total of 191 states, including China, Russia, France, Britain and the US, are parties to the treaty.
The core of the treaty is a pledge by nations not to acquire nuclear weapons if they do not have them, and for nuclear-armed countries to share peaceful technology while aiming to dismantle their arsenals.
In July 2017, the Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons was adopted by more than 100 UN states.
Campaigners view the more recent pact as filling the NPT’s “gaps” by demanding the elimination of nuclear weapons.
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