"An Iraqi army unit has found around 10 weapons and munition depots where Israel-made weapons and explosives were kept in Hamrin mountains," the Iraqi Al-Ansar news website quoted Sadeq Al-Moussavi, a member of Diyala provincial council, as saying. Moussavi said that the depot contained a lot of explosives, weapons and bombs all made by Israel. || The ISIL has links with Saudi intelligence and is believed to be indirectly supported by the Israeli regime. This is not the first time that such revelations are made about Israeli arms aids to the terrorists in the region. In February, a senior Iraqi military commander disclosed that the weapons used by ISIL in its war against both the governments of Syria and Iraq are Israeli-made. “All weapons seized from the terrorists from 2006 onwards have been advanced weapons made in Israel,” Major General Fazel Al-Barvari, commander of Iraq’s Anti-Terrorism Golden Battalion, wrote on his Facebook page.

Haaretz: UN reveals Israeli links with Syrian rebels

The CIA is bracing for what could be one of the most damaging moments in its history: a public airing of its "post-9/11" embrace of torture. ● The Senate intelligence committee is poised to release a landmark inquiry into torture as early as Tuesday, after the Obama administration made a last-ditch effort to suppress a report that has plunged relations between the CIA and its Senate overseer to a historic low point. White House spokesman Josh Earnest said on Monday the administration welcomed the release of the report, but warned US interests overseas were at risk of potentially violent reactions to its contents. Despite months of negotiation over how much of the 6,000-page report will be declassified, most of its findings will never see the light of the day. But even a partial release of the report will yield a furious response from the CIA and its allies.

RT.com: Senate accuses CIA of torturing prisoners, overstepping legal boundaries
HuffPo: With CIA Torture Report Set For Controversial Release, Washington Braces For Fallout

Iranian Foreign Ministry Spokeswoman Marzieh Afkham denounced the Israeli aggression which targeted two areas in Damascus Countryside on Sunday afternoon, saying that the aggression proves Israel’s complicity with the terrorists who seek to destroy Syria and murder innocent people. In a statement on Monday, Afkham saying that Israel seeks to exploit the crisis in Syria, but this will backfire on it, calling upon the UN to assume its responsibilities and put a stop to Israeli aggressions. In a similar statement, Official Spokesman of the Russian Foreign Ministry Alexander Lukashevich denounced the Israeli attack, saying that Moscow is deeply concerned over this serious development which requires qualification, stressing that the use of force in relations among states is unacceptable and merits denouncement.

Bill Van Auken ■ Israeli bombing of Syria threatens wider war

Last week, while in London, I went to see Julian Assange at the Ecuadorian embassy. We talked off the record of course, so I won’t divulge too much, but will post only what Julian insisted on making public. Before it’s too late. ● Assange shared an enlightening story about a Kurdish TV station that had been shut down in Denmark. The story, like so many others – from diplomatic cables with undiplomatic comments to hundreds of uninvestigated war crimes in Iraq – came to his attention through a leaked cryptogram. Once upon a time there was a Kurdish TV network in Denmark. It would just as happily 'be' anywhere else, but more fitting markets were off limits to the channel. The station, Roj TV, was aimed at Turkish Kurds, and that made the Turkish authorities very angry. Turkish officials pressed their NATO ally Denmark to shut down the TV channel under some plausible pretext. But Denmark was reluctant, saying that multiple inspections didn’t find any propaganda of terrorism and there were no grounds to close it down. Such things weren’t done there; Denmark, after all, is a democracy. 'Democracy' did not prevail for long.

Michael Snyder ■ Do you ever feel like you are living in a “Bizarro World”? That is how I feel much of the time. I look around and it seems as though some form of mass psychosis has descended on most of the population. Things that would have had Americans angrily marching in the streets a generation or two ago are now just accepted as “normal” by the “sheeple” that populate this nation. If the talking heads that endlessly spew nonsense at us through our televisions tell us to believe something, no matter how absurd it is, most people just go along with it. Before we had televisions and radios and computers and movies and the Internet, people actually had to do the hard work of thinking for themselves. But now we are all plugged into this giant “matrix” that tells us what to think, what to believe and how to feel about things. And unfortunately, the people that are telling us what to think and believe are delusional themselves. The blind are leading the blind, and as a result our nation is coming apart at the seams all around us. The following are 19 signs that you live in a country that has gone completely insane…

A new railway connecting Central Asia with the Persian Gulf through Iran was officially opened on December 3. With Kazakhstan completing its east-west rail line that links the country's centre to the west earlier this year, the new international railway line now offers direct passage for Chinese goods to Iran and on to the Gulf, as well as Europe via Turkey. ● Kazakh President Nursutlan Nazarbayev, Turkmen leader Gurbanguly Berdymukhamedov and Iranian President Hassan Rouhani opened the new Ozen-Gyzylkaya-Bereket-Etrek-Gorgan railway line on the Turkmen-Iranian border on December 3. The line is part of the international North-South corridor. The length of the Kazakh section of the railway is 146 kilometres, Turkmen 700km and Iranian 82km. The parties signed the agreement on the construction of the railway link in 2007 and construction started in 2009. ● The project means that Kazakhstan now has a direct line to Turkmenistan and Iran, bypassing Uzbekistan and cutting the route by hundreds of kilometres. Together with the new east-west railway line from Beyneu to Zhezkazgan opened by President Nazarbayev in August, the lines will drastically cut the transit time for Chinese goods to Europe via Russia and the Middle East.

Thad Beversdorf ■ Ron Paul wrote an eye opening article recently about some legislation that was just signed in Congress, namely H. Res. 758. In the article Dr. Paul explains the purpose of the resolution. It’s not a new law but provides a basis of facts that will be relied on for future action. So essentially the resolution purports that Russia behaved badly in various ways and by way of signing H. Res. 758 each congressman was indicating their agreement that the propositions contained therein are factual. Now just because a group of obnoxiously arrogant A-holes stand around in a tax-revenue financed chamber and say “yeah” to several assertions does not make those assertions factual, but here in the United Orwellian States of America it kinda does. Because those assertions that were voted to be fact (similar to the First Council of Nicaea) will now be written as factual history and taught to our children as having happened that way. The very same way we all attained our ideas of American superiority.The dishonesty and ignorance it creates is reason enough not to do such things, however, the real stinker of it is, as Dr. Paul so clearly points out, the sole purpose of H. Res. 758 is simply a pouring of the legal foundation for something much more substantive. You see this is how wars begin.

Paul Craig Roberts ■ This is a very important article by Thad Beversdorf. The article documents that US military invasions of Iraq and Syria were planned long in advance of 9/11 and that the conflict that Washington is engineering with Russia long predates the conflict that Washington has orchestrated in Ukraine. Beversdorf demonstrates that the same handful of neoconservatives have been involved in writing policy papers that define Iraq, Syria, and Russia as threats. With the threat defined, the same people write letters to the US president describing an urgent need to act. Then the same people appointed to office and in power implement the military actions against the threat. Beversdorf establishes that it is all based on lies and deception of the Western peoples. Now the same handful of neoconservative ideologues are focused on “destroying Russia economically to disable them militarily in an effort to prevent a Sino-Soviet alliance.” This attempt to fortify Washington’s power over the world has the earmarks of World War III.

Paul Craig Roberts ■ In his Presidential Address to the Federal Assembly, Russian President Vladimir Putin told the Federal Assembly that Washington’s plan for Russia is to break the country into pieces as was done to Yugoslavia. The American scenario for Russia is “disintegration and dismemberment.” Putin reminded Washington that speaking to Russia from a position of force is futile and will lead Washington to the same fate as Hitler. Putin also noted that Washington’s disregard for its own and international law had made the United States into a lawless state that is a danger to the world. Most of Putin’s address is about Russia’s development plans. At every stage of these plans Putin stresses that the focus is on the welfare of the Russian population, not on the creation of a small class of rich elites. Education, healthcare, and the social welfare system are a public benefit for all citizens. “Attention to the people cannot be faked.” Self-respect and honor are the basis for reputation, and the reputation of hospitals, schools, universities, and social institutions are important to the Russia’s reputation. There is no belligerence in Putin’s address. We do not go about seeking enemies, he told the Assembly. Russia will cooperate with any country on an equal basis, but Russia will not be an American vassal. Here is the URL to a rushed official translation of Putin’s address. Nuances and some precision of meaning and word choices are lost to time demands.

Paul Craig Roberts ■ Russia Has Western Enemies, Not Partners
The Saker ■ Disgusted, Russia officially gives up any pretense of “dialog” with the AngloZionist Empire
pravda.ru: Putin: Russia will never follow instructions from the West