Although 2016's X-Men: Apocalypse concluded the "First Class" trilogy that began in 2011, the X-Men film franchise isn't finished spending time with this group of mutant characters. Later this year, we'll reunite with Professor Xavier's team of superheroes in X-Men: Dark Phoenix, which, like 2006's X-Men: The Last Stand, will adapt the classic storyline The Dark Phoenix Saga. Along with having to deal with Jean Grey in her Dark Phoenix form, the X-Men will also face an enemy played by Jessica Chastain. However, this character may have deeper ties to the Marvel mythology than previously suspected, as it's being reported that X-Men: Dark Phoenix will feature the Skrulls, the same shapeshifting alien species that is already set to appear in Captain Marvel. Back in December, Jessica Chastain's X-Men: Dark Phoenix character was described as an "otherworldly shapeshifter who manipulates Phoenix for her own agenda." So right off the bat, we know that this mysterious individual can alter her appearance. With Chastain having already debunked the rumor she was playing Empress Lilandra of the Shi'ar Empire, it was hard to guess who this villain was. But supposedly X-Men: Dark Phoenix will include the Skrulls, so while we still don't know what Chastain's character is named, presumably this makes her someone high up within the Skull Empire. The Skrulls are one of the few Marvel properties that Fox and Marvel Studios share (though that will obviously change if Disney's Fox purchase goes through), and at last summer's San Diego Comic-Con, it was announced that Captain Marvel would be set in the 1990s and see Carol Danvers battling the Skrulls. This wouldn't be the first time that an X-Men movie has beaten the MCU to adapting a character for the silver screen first. 2014's X-Men: Days of Future Past introduced Evan Peter's Quicksilver, who was brought in to replace Juggernaut, and a year later, Aaron Taylor-Johnson brought the same speedster to life in Avengers: Age of Ultron. As for the Skrulls, while they started out as enemies for the Fantastic Four, over the years they've graduated to clashing with heroes from all corners of the Marvel universe. It's unclear if it was always the plan for X-Men: Dark Phoenix to include the Skrulls, particularly since they didn't play any role in the original Dark Phoenix Saga, but assuming this report is true, then the X-Men universe's versions of these aliens will debut four months before the MCU versions. It would also be interesting to see how the X-Men Skrulls are visually different from the MCU Skrulls in their natural forms. Along with reporting about the Skrulls, Jeremy Conner, a.k.a. Manabyte, has heard from a source that X-Men: Dark Phoenix is better than X-Men: Apocalypse, but not as good as X-Men: Days of Future Past. Apparently Dark Phoenix is also "very serious with little humor," but director Simon Kinberg did a good job with the movie. There's still nine months to go until Dark Phoenix's release, but ideally within the next few months the first teaser trailer will be released, giving us our first idea of what this story holds in store. X-Men: Dark Phoenix hits theaters on November 2, and Captain Marvel will follow on March 8, 2019. For all the latest comic book movie news, Skrull-related or otherwise, keep checking back with CinemaBlend.

In 2015, Ryan Coogler breathed new life into the Rocky franchise with Creed. With this only being his second film, Ryan Coogler resurrected a beloved series and forged a new path for it to continue on into the future. So naturally, many wanted Ryan Coogler to return to the director's chair for Creed 2. Instead, the directing reins initally went to Sylvester Stallone before ultimately being passed to Steven Caple Jr. However, even if it wasn't meant to be, Ryan Coogler was actually open to returning for Creed 2 as he explained: I mean, of course it was possible. Creed was about me and my dad, so it's a movie that I find difficult to watch. It's difficult for me to even think about it, I've got so many emotional ties to it, not to mention you know how much I care about the people involved. I care deeply for Mike, obviously, deeply for Tessa, and I grew incredibly close with Sly in making that. These are people that I wanna see do well and win at all costs. There's timing, and that film for whatever reason it had to go when it's going. I think it's a blessing that it's going, man. I think it's amazing that they found an incredible filmmaker in Steven Caple Jr., who's a guy I actually went to film school with, who I have a lot of love and respect for. I can't wait to see what he does with it. It sounds like Creed was a hugely emotional film for the young director, so it's understandable that he may have been hesitant to return or feels that he said all he has to say with the first film. If he finds it difficult to even think about Creed, then perhaps it is better for him to have put all that emotion into the film once and not have to go through that experience again. But Ryan Coogler's comments to Variety's Playback Podcast seem to indicate that scheduling was the determining factor in him not returning. If the studio decided that Creed 2 needed to hit a certain release date for financial reasons, and Ryan Coogler was still tied up with other things, there is not much he could have done to remain director. This is hardly a bad thing or cause for consternation, though. While no one would have objected to Ryan Coogler returning for Creed 2, he has already done his part in re-launching the franchise, and now he gets to turn it over to another new voice who just happens to be a friend of his. Ryan Coogler is batting a thousand at the moment and is undoubtedly the hottest name in Hollywood at the moment thanks to his first blockbuster, the Marvel Cinematic Universe film, Black Panther. In the wake of that film's incredible box office performance, Ryan Coogler can pretty much write his own ticket, and all of Hollywood will be watching his future with great interest. And just because the director isn't returning for Creed 2 doesn't mean his days of working with Michael B. Jordan are over. The director and actor duo are expected to reunite for Wrong Answer, a film based on the true story of an Atlanta teacher who changed the answers on his student's standardized tests in order to secure funding for the school. With any luck, Creed 2 will announce another exciting new storyteller to watch in Steven Caple Jr. when it hits theaters on November 21. Creed 2 will follow Michael B. Jordan's Adonis Johnson as he faces off with the son of Rocky IV's Ivan Drago, Viktor. For all of this years biggest films, check out our release guide.

GRAPHIC video footage shows an intruder charging into an empty liquor store in Oklahoma last Thursday, brandishing a 12-gauge shotgun and cleaning out the cash register. But as the robber tries to escape, the fearless duo lock him in and pull out two handguns, shooting him multiple times. According to The Sun, the store owner’s daughter Ashley Lee, 30, is shown holding up her hands as the intruder wipes out the till and menacingly brandishes his weapon. But as he appears to try to make his exit, the quick-thinking daughter and her mum Tina Ring, 53, lock him in the store by pressing a button and they slip under the cash register to hide themselves from sight. He tries to leave again but the daughter aims her gun at the man once more and the mother and robber wrestle fiercely on the floor as he tries to wrest the gun off her before appearing to hit her. The end of the terrifying clip shows the two women leaving the shop as the robber falls on the floor. The robber reportedly drove himself to a local hospital where he was put into a medically induced coma and remains in a critical but stable condition. He is yet to be questioned by police. Mrs Ring, who suffered a gash to the head requiring staples, told Tulsa World: “I didn’t want him to hurt my daughter. “That was my main thought. “All I was thinking was ‘just give him the money and go’ and the next thing I know I see him back in my face. “I’m still in shock. I don’t think I have really processed everything yet.” Store owner Justin Christian, 33, was out of town at the time of the attack and says his mother and sister “did what they had to do”. He told local TV station KJRH-TV: “I’m very proud of them. They fought for their life. “You’re not going to scare me off from my store. This is what feeds my family, this is what pays my bills.” Sergeant Brandon Watkins, of the Tulsa Police Department, identified Tyrone Lee as the alleged attacker and said he is suspected of carrying out several other armed robberies in the area. He said: “It does appear that this is going to be the guy we had been looking for. “He’s done multiple robberies here in Tulsa, as well as up in the county.” Officers are reported to be monitoring Lee’s condition and he is expected to survive.

DAWN French has paid tribute to her “loving friend” actress Emma Chambers, the star of The Vicar of Dibley and Notting Hill, who has died aged 53. Taking to Twitter, French posted a tribute to the British actress, famed for playing kooky characters. Chambers played loveable Alice Tinker alongside French from 1994 to 2007 in the long-running sitcom The Vicar of Dibley. She also captured international attention for her supporting role in the 1999 Hugh Grant and Julia Roberts comedy Notting Hill. In the movie, she played Honey, Hugh Grant’s little sister and the romantic interest of Rhys Ifans’ character Spike. The Sun reports a statement from her agency said Chambers died from natural causes and that she would be “greatly missed”. “Emma created a wealth of characters and an immense body of work. She brought laughter and joy to many,” the statement said. Jon Plowman, executive producer of The Vicar of Dibley and former head of comedy at the BBC, said: “This is a sad day. Emma was a gifted comic actress who made any part she played — no matter how ditzy or other worldly — look easy. “To create a much loved comic character as she did, you have to be every bit as bright and clever as Emma always was. “She was great fun to work with and adored by all the cast and crew of Vicar of Dibley. She will be missed and our deepest condolences go out to her family and friends.’ Hugh Grant led celebrity tributes to his former co-star. “Emma Chambers was a hilarious and very warm person and of course a brilliant actress. Very sad news,” he tweeted. James Dreyfus, who starred alongside Chambers in Notting Hill also paid tribute on Twitter. He said: “RIP the wonderful and talented Emma Chambers. Unique & unspeakably funny. Too young. Thoughts with her family.” In 1998, she won the British Comedy Award for best TV actress for her performance in The Vicor of Dibley. Former Top Gear presenter Jeremy Clarkson recalled Chambers being “very funny”. “I’m sad about Emma Chambers. Knew her when she was a kid in Doncaster. She was very funny,” he said. Chambers is survived by her husband, fellow actor Ian Dunn. She tied the knot in 1991 at a low-key ceremony in New Forest and described her marriage as ‘glorious’ in an interview in January this year. “My wedding was very short. I was playing the lead in an Alan Ayckbourn play and was only given one day off,” she told Hitberry magazine. “My sister, Sarah Doukas, is a model agent and one of her bookers made me a dress which cost £180. I still look at it in my wardrobe and think it is one of the most beautiful things I have ever seen.”

CHINA’S foreign ministry is demanding the United States stop enacting unilateral sanctions against Chinese entities and individuals, after Washington said it was imposing its largest package of sanctions to pressure North Korea. China has lodged “stern representations” with the US over the sanctions, whose targets include a Taiwan passport holder, as well as shipping and energy firms in mainland China, Hong Kong, Taiwan and Singapore. China “demands the US side immediately stops such relevant mistaken actions to avoid harming bilateral co-operation in the relevant area”, the ministry said in a short statement on Saturday. It comes after US President Donald Trump said the US relationship with China was the “best ever”. “I don’t think we’ve ever had a better relationship with China than we do right now,” Mr Trump said during a joint press conference with Australian Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull. “My personal relationship with President Xi is quite extraordinary. He is somebody that I like. I think he likes me.” Yesterday, Mr Trump rolled out fresh sanctions against North Korea-linked shipping assets, hailing the package as the “heaviest sanctions ever” levied on the Pyongyang regime. In light of past US embargoes, that is likely an overstatement, but Treasury Secretary Steve Mnuchin confirmed the sanctions covered “virtually all the ships” North Korea is “using at this moment in time.” Speaking to reporters in Pyeongchang Saturday on a visit to the Winter Olympics, White House spokeswoman Sarah Sanders said: “Hopefully we’ll see a change on the part of the North Koreans to start to denuclearise the peninsula, that’s what our focus is.” She added: “I can tell you the president won’t make the mistakes the previous administration has and be soft or weak.”

A MAN has allegedly used a bottle of absinthe to bludgeon his wife to death during their boozy final night together, according to the New York Post. Kathleen Dawn “Kat” West, 42 — a stay-at-home mum who lived a double life on a subscription-only adult website under the name “Kitty Kat West” — died of blunt-force trauma after being whacked in the head with a bottle of Lucid-brand absinthe on January 12. Her husband, William “Jeff” West, 44, was arrested on murder charges last Thursday. A friend of West’s, Mike Waters, said the death was an alcohol-fuelled accident in a since-deleted Facebook post, according to the Daily Mail. “I was able to talk to my friend Jeff last night in length. In the upcoming days true facts will be coming out”, Mr Waters wrote on January 20. “And everybody will find out that this was a terrible accident, that involved excessive alcohol consumption …. Absinthe!” Kathleen West’s body was discovered at 5 a.m. the day after her murder, naked except for a sports bra. A cellphone with a green bottle balanced on top of it were discovered nearby, which witnesses said appeared staged. The night of Kathleen West’s death, the couple — who are from Calera, Alabama — was celebrating a “date night” and bought bottles of Lucid and Jameson Irish whiskey from R & R Wine and Liquor store. Kathleen West is seen on surveillance footage laughing and, at one point, Jeff West gives her a playful pat on the behind. A friend said that Jeff was well aware of his wife’s online persona and “got off” on the idea that she was wanted by other men. “She was a sweet lady who was fun, playful and loved to tease either sex,” the friend said. “I know Jeff was well aware of whatever it was she or they were doing.” Jeff West is being held on $500,000 bail. Absinthe, a green, anise-flavoured liquor said to cause hallucinations, has long been touted by artists, writers and poets for its ability to fuel creativity. However, incidents of absinthe-related alcohol abuse led to it being banned in the US in 1912. It only became legal again to buy in 2007 without thujone, a chemical substance extracted from the wormwood plant, believed to give the so-called ‘Green Fairy’ its mind-altering effects.

US PRESIDENT Donald Trump may soon visit Down Under, praising the “terrific” relationship between America and Australia during a White House meeting with Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull. The pair met at the Oval Office early yesterday morning, with Mr Trump and Mr Turnbull discussing key issues of economic and regional security, including tax reform, the Trans Pacific Partnership and how the alliance was managing tensions with China and North Korea. The meeting came as the US announced strict new sanctions on the North Korean regime aimed at cutting off smuggling routes that defy current UN sanctions. Praising Australia as a key ally in a campaign of “maximum pressure” on Pyongyang, Mr Trump warned that if sanctions failed, there would be a “phase two” inflicted on the rogue nation. “If the sanctions don’t work, we’ll have to go to phase two. Phase two may be a very rough thing. It may be a very unfortunate thing for the world,” Mr Trump said at a joint media conference with Mr Turnbull at the White House. On China, Mr Trump said he would like to see Australia assist with freedom of navigation exercises in the South China Sea, a manoeuvre so far resisted by Australia given it would spark tensions between Canberra and Beijing. “We would love to have Australia involved and I think Australia wants us to stay involved,” Mr Trump said. Mr Trump said the US and China had a very strong relationship, but warned lopsided trade between the two countries was a risk. “China is tough, they’re getting stronger to a large extent from a lot of the money they’ve made from having poor leadership in the US because the US leadership has allowed them to get away with murder,” he said. “I have to say we have developed a great relationship with China, other than the fact they had been killing us on trade for a long period of time.” Despite Australia hoping to win over the US on the Trans Pacific Partnership, which is being pursued by the 11 other Pacific rim countries despite America’s withdrawal, Mr Trump said it was not a good deal. “TPP was a very bad deal for the United States — it would have cost us a tremendous amount of jobs, but there is a possibility I would go in but they will be offering us a much better deal,” he said. “I like bilateral deals much more than multilateral — you negotiate with one country and if it doesn’t work out, you terminate.” While the two leaders saw eye to eye on most foreign policy issues, Mr Turnbull was reluctant to engage in the domestic debate raging in America over gun law reform in the wake of the Florida school shooting that left 17 dead. When asked by the American media about Australia’s gun crackdown after the Port Arthur massacre in 1996, Mr Turnbull said semi-automatic and automatic weapons were “essentially not available” in Australia following the reforms. But he also said that Australia’s history with gun control was “very different” to America’s. With the visit conducted under the banner of “100 years of mateship” between Australia and the US, Mr Trump announced one of the new Littoral Combat navy ships being built for the US Navy by WA shipbuilder Austal would be named the USS Canberra. When asked if he would soon like to visit Australia, Mr Trump said, “I would, absolutely”. “Love it. We will be there, (it is a) great place”.

MADELEINE Wilford was in her psychology class when she heard shots being fired at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Florida. The 17-year-old told the Deseret News that Nikolas Cruz was a few classrooms down shooting through one classroom door, then another. She says she got pushed towards the middle of the classroom as students dived to the floor. “All of a sudden I felt a shot hit me,” Madeleine said, not recalling the feeling the other three bullets. “I realised I was shot and an immense amount of pain went over me. The first thing I thought was that I was going to die. I was screaming, ‘Help me! Help me!’ I was frantic. I didn’t know what to do.” She says she “felt a sense of peace” before she slumped against a wall and blacked out. First-responders put gunshot patches on her wounds to slow the blood loss. Doctors had to put Madeleine on a ventilator, had three tendons in her right arm reattached and titanium plates fused to her broken ribs The SWAT team who responded to the shooting, and later visited her in hospital, said her survival should help lift others. “She’s serving as a thing people can look to and see as a sign of hope,” David Wilford told the Deseret News. “She was shot four times with an assault rifle at close range and now she’s sitting downstairs a week later with two friends from church, laughing. I can’t even believe it.” US President Donald Trump and First Lady Melania Trump also visited Madeleine and offered to write a letter of recommendation for her university application. Her mother, Missy Cantrell Wilford, thanked God for saving her daughter. “I feel Blessed beyond words, knowing that many didn’t survive,” she said. “She had [a bullet] that went through her back, crushing her ribs, piercing through her right lung and exiting through her stomach. “Several went through the shoulder and travelled the length of her right arm before exiting ... Even after all of that, the bullets missed her liver, reproduction organs, heart, she could have been paralysed. It is a miracle,” she said.

US PRESIDENT Donald Trump’s daughter toured the 2018 Winter Olympics on Saturday, the morning after telling South Korea’s president that she will use her visit to the PyeongChang Games to advocate maximum pressure on North Korea to halt its nuclear program. According to the New York Post, Ivanka Trump, who is one of her father’s close advisers, is leading the US delegation at this weekend’s closing ceremony for the PyeongChang Games. Ms Trump paid a visit to the American team’s headquarters to meet with Olympians and gave a presidential challenge coin to Garrett Hines, a former US bobsledder and Army reservist, thanking him for his service. Under cloudy skies, Ms Trump watched her first event Saturday morning — Big Air jump snowboarding and saw American snowboarder Kyle Mack take a silver medal. She sat in the stands with White House press secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders and US IOC member Angela Ruggiero and watched the event at the Alpensia Ski Jumping Centre. In PyeongChang on Saturday morning, Ivanka Trump watched snowboarders go on runs at the Big Air jump and saw American snowboarder Kyle Mack take a silver medal. A smiling Ms Trump, wearing a Team USA hat and red snowsuit, chatted with members of her delegation and South Korea first lady Kim Jung-souk. Also with her was IOC board member and 1998 hockey gold medallist Angela Ruggiero. After the event ended, Trump spoke with some of the South Korean athletes who were guests of the delegation and posed for selfies. While the games appear to have paved the way for possible rapprochement between the Koreas, U.S. and North Korean officials have yet to make direct contact. Earlier this week, the U.S. government said Pence had been set to meet North Korean officials during his visit to South Korea, but that the North Korean side cancelled at the last minute. For now, there are no signs that Ivanka Trump will meet Kim Yong Chol, vice chairman of North Korea’s ruling Workers’ Party Central Committee, who is to attend the closing ceremony. The White House has emphasised that the purpose of her visit is to celebrate the achievements of the athletes, noting that she is a winter sports enthusiast herself. She is expected to attend the games on Saturday before Sunday’s closing ceremony. President Trump tweeted prior to his daughter’s arrival “We cannot have a better, or smarter, person representing our country.” On Friday, the Trump administration announced sanctions on more than 50 vessels, shipping companies and trade businesses to turn up the pressure on North Korea to denuclearise. US officials said that US President Trump had discussed the action with South Korean President Moon Jae-in ahead of the announcement in Washington. Shortly after arriving on Friday, Ms Trump said she was in South Korea to celebrate the Olympics and to reaffirm the US commitment to a “maximum pressure campaign to ensure that the Korean Peninsula is denuclearised.”

The UN Security Council has unanimously approved a resolution demanding a 30-day ceasefire in Syria to allow aid deliveries and medical evacuations. However, some of the biggest jihadist rebel groups, and their associates, are not covered by the truce, raising questions about its real impact. The Eastern Ghouta rebel enclave near Damascus has been bombarded by government forces for the past week. After the vote in New York, activists said air strikes were continuing. The vote had been delayed several times since Thursday as members struggled to come to an agreement. Russia, an ally of Syria's government, wanted changes, while Western diplomats accused Moscow of stalling for time. Some 500 people are said to have been killed by government forces in the enclave since last Sunday while rebels fire on Damascus has reportedly killed at least 16 civilians. Why was the vote delayed? The draft had said the ceasefire would not apply to operations against the Islamic State (IS) group, al-Qaeda and the Nusra Front. The Nusra Front is a former al-Qaeda affiliate in Syria which changed its name to Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS) when it formed an alliance with other militants last year. After Russia asked for the resolution to include other groups "co-operating with them", the final text specifies that operations may continue against "individuals, groups, undertakings and entities" associated with IS, al-Qaeda or other groups designated by the Security Council as terrorists. The US ambassador to the UN, Nikki Haley, called for the ceasefire to be implemented immediately but said she was sceptical that Syria would comply. She accused Russia of having "dragged out the negotiations". She said: "In the three days it took us to adopt this resolution, how many mothers lost their kids to the bombing and the shelling?" France's UN representative, François Delattre, also said the action was very "belated". On Friday he said failure to act could spell the end of the UN itself. Russia's UN envoy, Vassily Nebenzia, said the ceasefire would not be possible without agreements between warring factions. How bad is the situation in the Eastern Ghouta? UN Secretary General Antonio Guterres has said the situation in the Eastern Ghouta is like "hell on Earth". On Saturday, the UK-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said at least 29 civilians had been killed, including 17 in the main town, Douma. The group said the strikes were being carried out by both Syrian and Russian planes although Russia denies direct involvement. Barrel bombs and shells have been dropped on the area, where some 393,000 people remain trapped. Aid groups report several hospitals being put out of action since Sunday. The Syrian government has denied targeting civilians and said it is trying to liberate the Eastern Ghouta from "terrorists" - a term it has used to describe both the jihadist militants and the mainstream rebel groups that hold the enclave. Who are the rebels in the enclave? The rebels in Eastern Ghouta are not one cohesive group. They encompass multiple factions, including jihadists, and in-fighting between them has led to past losses of ground to the Syrian government. The two biggest groups in the area are Jaish al-Islam and its rival Faylaq al-Rahman. The latter has in the past fought alongside HTS. The Syrian government says its attempts to recapture Eastern Ghouta are directly due to the HTS presence there.

Two major US airlines have joined a growing list of companies to cut ties with the National Rifle Association following the Florida school shooting. United and Delta airlines have both announced they are ending discounts for NRA members. The killing of 17 people in Florida has revived the gun control debate in the US, with student survivors playing a leading role in calling for change. Firms with links to the US gun lobby have faced calls for a boycott. Activists have flooded the NRA's corporate partners with comments on social media under the hashtag #BoycottNRA. The suspect in the attack, Nikolas Cruz, was said to be obsessed with guns and bought the semi-automatic rifle he allegedly used at the school in Parkland legally last year while aged 18. Which companies have cut NRA ties? United and Delta airlines were the latest firms on Saturday to drop their ties to the powerful gun advocacy organisation. Between them they fly more than 300 million passengers a year. Other firms dropping ties to the NRA include: - Enterprise Holdings, which owns rental car brands Alamo, Enterprise and National, said discounts offered to NRA members would end on 26 March - Another car rental firm, Hertz, also said it was ending discounts offered to NRA members - The family-owned First National Bank of Omaha said it would not renew NRA-branded credit cards, citing "customer feedback" - Insurance firm Chubb said it had stopped underwriting an NRA-branded insurance policy three months ago - Software firm Symantec said it had stopped its discount programme with the NRA - Two removal firms, Allied Van Lines and NorthAmerican Van Lines, ended their affiliate relationship with the NRA and asked for their details to be removed from its website - Insurer MetLife Inc also cut ties. What has the NRA said? The NRA, which claims five million members, did not respond to a request for comment about the effect of the boycott. The group defended itself in comments on Twitter, saying people upset about the shooting should focus on lapses by law enforcement. "Instead of placing the blame on an organization that defends everyone's #2A rights, maybe people should take a hard look at the number of failures by the FBI and local law enforcement agencies, or does that not fit your agenda?" it wrote, referring to the constitutional amendment that protects gun rights. NRA chief executive Wayne LaPierre spoke out on Thursday, arguing that "opportunists" were using the 14 February tragedy to expand gun control and abolish US gun rights. "They hate the NRA. They hate the second amendment. They hate individual freedom," he said. Prior campaigns aimed at the NRA have had limited results. Is this a turning point? The US is no stranger to school shootings, but the response of students who survived the attack on Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School appears to have given fresh impetus to attempts to strengthen gun control. A marketing professor, Scott Galloway, told NBC News that in dropping ties to the NRA, companies were calculating what would be in the best interests of their business. "The most valuable person in world of consumer business is an 18 year old. Their recent galvanization against the issue has made the NRA very uncool," he said. Bob Spitzer, a scholar on gun politics at SUNY Cortland, agreed the companies' moves were most likely a reaction to the Florida shooting, but said it was too early to say what the impact would be. "If this is as far as it goes, it probably won't have any measurable effect... Usually what happens is that the storm passes, and the NRA counts on that," he told CBS.

Brigitte Bardot has become the latest French celebrity to weigh in on a family dispute over the estate of the late singer Johnny Hallyday. In a radio interview, the movie legend urged Hallyday's widow Laeticia - named as his main heir - to give some of the money back to his older children. Singer David Hallyday and actress Laura Smet, who were left with nothing, are contesting their father's will. Johnny Hallyday died in December from lung cancer at the age of 74. Bardot told French radio station Europe 1 on Saturday: "I am disgusted. If I were Laeticia, I would put things right. I would give David and Laura what they deserve." Under the country's inheritance laws, which go back to the French Revolution, all children should be given roughly equal shares of an estate. But Hallyday, who had a home in California and was domiciled there for tax purposes, left everything in his will to Laeticia, his fourth wife, and their two adopted daughters. Laura Smet, 34, and David Hallyday, 51, announced their legal challenge last week. Since then a number of big names in the world of French entertainment have spoken out on the matter. Eddy Mitchell, another French rock legend and friend of the late singer, said: "I don't understand how someone can disinherit his children." Actor Jean Reno, a friend of both Johnny and Laeticia, urged the family not to yield to "hatred". Singer Sylvie Vartan, Hallyday's first wife and David's mother, said that during their divorce in 1980 she had urged Johnny to give her share of their home to their son.

Palestinian armed group Hamas has responded to the US announcement that it will open its Jerusalem embassy in May. The group said it was a “new aggression” and a “provocation.” “Moving the US embassy to Jerusalem is a violation of the international law and goes against the international conventions,” Hamas Spokesman Abdul-Latif al-Qanou said in a statement. “This would never legalise the Zionist occupation of our land or change the reality and identity of Jerusalem.” The embassy will open in May, which coincides with the 70th anniversary of the Nakba (‘catastrophe’), the Palestinian name for the mass exodus of Arabs from their homes before the state of Israel was declared in 1948. Qanou said Hamas sees this as “an intended negligence of our people and a new aggression on their rights and their holy sites.” “This is a clear provocation of the feelings of the Islamic and Arab nations,” he added. The sentiment echoes those of Palestinian government spokesman Yousef al-Mahmoud on Saturday, who said it “constituted a clear and explicit violation of United Nations resolutions and all humanitarian and international laws.” The US State Department announced the move on Friday, explaining the opening coincides with “Israel’s 70th anniversary.” The announcement came following Trump’s December decision to break with years of US tradition with the promise to move the embassy from its current location in Tel Aviv to Jerusalem. Israel annexed East Jerusalem in 1967 and Palestinians consider it the capital of its future state. The US Jerusalem embassy will be located in a building in Arnona, where the US currently has its Consulate. It said by the end of 2019, it intends to open a new embassy within its Arnona compound and will then search for a permanent Embassy site.

Ecuador said its efforts to negotiate with the UK over WikiLeaks’ founder Julian Assange’s exit from its embassy in London have failed. Assange has been living in the embassy since 2012. Foreign Minister Maria Fernanda Espinosa told reporters on Friday that the UK was unwilling to take part in talks. “On the issue of mediation, I have to say very honestly that it has not been successful because two parties are needed to mediate... Ecuador is willing, but not necessarily the other party,” adding that Ecuador would “continue looking for mechanisms.” Assange sought political asylum in 2012 in a bid to escape extradition to Sweden where he was wanted for questioning regarding allegations of sexual assault. Assange feared he would be extradited from Sweden to the US, where he’s wanted for publishing hundreds of thousands of US diplomatic cables and war logs leaked by whistleblower Chelsea Manning. Despite Ecuador’s efforts, which included making Assange a citizen in the hopes of granting him diplomatic immunity, the UK has proven unwilling to negotiate the Australian publisher’s exit from the country. An arrest warrant was issued for him via Interpol as part of Sweden’s investigation. Assange challenged the warrants in court but was unsuccessful and subsequently entered the embassy, which was a breach of his bail conditions. In February, a UK court upheld the 2012 arrest warrant, despite the fact that Sweden dropped its case last May. The Trump administration has made its stance on Assange clear, despite Trump repeatedly citing his “love” for the whistleblowing organization during the 2016 presidential election. US Attorney General Jeff Sessions said “Assange’s arrest is a priority,” while CIA Director Mike Pompeo has made a number of statements about Assange, including calling him a “non-state hostile intelligence service.” He also claimed “Assange has no First Amendment rights” and that “the CIA is working to take down WikiLeaks.” Reuters reports a US government official said federal prosecutors are still pursuing a criminal investigation against WikiLeaks.

After admitting last week that "protocol was not followed" when at least two individuals called the FBI's anonymous tip line to warn that Nikolas Cruz, the 19-year-old suspected of murdering 17 of his former classmates, the No. 2 FBI official said Thursday that he had visited the FBI's call center this week as part of his review of why the tip wasn't followed. He also addressed, in the most detail yet, the mounting criticisms facing the bureau, according to the Washington Post. The remarks followed NRA spokeswoman Dana Loesch's assertion that the FBI was primarily to blame for not preventing the shooting. Shortly before Bowdich spoke Thursday, NRA chief executive Wayne LaPierre, who was speaking at the same event, said the FBI's leaders had gone "rogue." Acting deputy director David Bowdich said he believes the biggest threat to the FBI is "losing the faith of the American people" "Look, I don’t want to get into who says what, but I do want to project out to the public, is when I look through the prism of risk for our organization, I find the number one risk for our organization is losing the faith and confidence of the American people. Number one," Bowdich said when asked about the criticism from the NRA and others. FBI Director Christopher Wray - who was appointed by Trump - has come under fire, with several prominent Republicans, including Florida Gov. Rick Scott, calling for him to resign. President Trump has said the bureau’s handling of the matter was “not acceptable.” Still, while Bowdich provided some details about his visit to the FBI call center, he offered no new insight into why or how the tip wasn't followed up on. The FBI is actively investigating why the tip wasn't passed on to its Miami field office. Bowdich said Thursday that he had visited the call center Monday with a team and sat in on some calls. He called the center “a professional operation” but added: “Now let me be clear that there was a mistake made. We know that. But it is our job to make sure that we do everything in our power to ensure that does not happen again.” Bowdich did not directly address a question about why the tip on Cruz was not passed to agents in the field, though he hinted that those in the call center might have made a judgment error. "People make judgments out on the streets every day. Every now and then, those judgments may not have been the best judgment based on the information they had at the time," Bowdich said. Last year, the FBI received about 765,000 calls, in addition to about 750,000 Internet tips, and 9 out of 10 did not produce leads that could be followed. He said the bureau was going back through its "holdings" to make sure there aren't any other similar tips that have slipped through the cracks. Wray has held on so far, and speculation is mounting that he might stay on to supervise the internal probe into why, exactly, these tips weren't followed up on.

Secretary Boris Johnson on "the illegal annexation of the Crimea." A corresponding statement appeared on the website of the diplomatic mission. In the note "The annexation of the Crimea: four years later", published on the portal of the British government, Johnson calls for the preservation of sanctions imposed against Moscow "as long as the Crimean territories remain under the control of the Kremlin, and also until the Minsk agreements are upheld." The reaction of the Russian diplomatic mission was followed a day later. "It is unfortunate that the article does not mention the fourth anniversary of the coup in Kiev, which was supported by the West in general and the United Kingdom in particular, and during which the Constitution of Ukraine was grossly violated, as well as the agreements between President Yanukovych and the opposition with the mediation of Germany, France and Poland, "the statement said. Then the diplomats answered four theses from Johnson's article. On the referendum The first was the minister's statement about the "fictitious referendum" in the Crimea. "Let me remind you that the right of peoples to self-determination is enshrined in the UN Charter, the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights of 1966, as well as in the Declaration of Principles of International Law of 1970," the embassy said. It is also stressed that the will of the people is the main criterion of the democratic process. "As for the British experience, Brexit, the Falkland Islands, Gibraltar or Scotland are very indicative in this respect," summed up the embassy. On the change of borders The second point was the words of the British Minister about "the first violent change of borders since 1945". "We believe that the Serbian people have a different opinion on this issue," the diplomats said, "in 1999, 78 days of bombing of the territory of Yugoslavia actually destroyed it as a state, forcefully (without any referendum) separating Kosovo from Serbia." About promises The third thesis of Johnson was a statement that Russia violated its obligations to comply with the Ukrainian borders established by the 1994 Budapest Memorandum. "First, Ukraine's loss of its territorial integrity was the result of internal processes and the democratic resolution of the inhabitants of the Crimea." Secondly, in Ukraine, Ukraine promised to fight aggressive nationalism and chauvinism.This promise was obviously violated, and, by the way, we did not see a special reaction from Great Britain, which remains one of the guarantors of the Budapest Memorandum. " About the Crimean Tatars The final statement of the head of the British Foreign Ministry became the words about "the persecution of the Crimean Tatars." "Since the British Foreign Ministry did not have enough of four years to get acquainted with some facts on this issue, we are forced to fill the gaps ourselves." Today, in Crimea, the language of the Crimean Tatars along with Russian and Ukrainian is recognized as official, "the report said. The statistics below show the involvement of the Crimean Tatars in the political, economic, cultural and religious life of the peninsula. On the sides of the Minsk Agreements In Crimea, Kiev's absurd attempts to arrange a "gas blockade" The Russian embassy also reminded Johnson that the Minsk agreement parties - Kiev, Donetsk and Lugansk, and it is on these three parties that they are responsible for their implementation. "We believe that the British authorities will finally change their attitude to what is happening in Ukraine, otherwise the constant accusations against Russia will continue to prompt Kiev to pursue a policy that is deliberately doomed to failure," the diplomatic mission concluded. Crimea joined the Russian Federation after a referendum held there in March 2014. For this decision, more than 95 percent of the inhabitants of the peninsula voted. The plebiscite took place after a coup in Ukraine. Local authorities initiated a referendum after a coup in Ukraine in February 2014. Ukraine still considers Crimea "temporarily occupied territory". At the same time Moscow has repeatedly stated that the accession of the peninsula does not contradict the norms of international law and the UN Charter.

Raising rent prices and low wages have resulted in thousands of people across the city of Los Angeles becoming homeless, many of them now living in cars and RVs if they were able to keep it together that well. According to the most recent counts by the KPCC, there are at least 7,000 people live in their cars in Los Angeles. Many of these people still maintain jobs and try to live the most fulfilled lives that they can, but they are constantly facing problems from authorities. It is such a common issue that many churches have opened up their parking lots to people living out of their cars. For example, the New Beginnings Counseling Center opened up their parking lot for a “Safe Parking program,” which was intended to provide a safe and welcome parking place for people living out of their cars. Unfortunately, under new legislation passed in Los Angeles, programs like this will be illegal, because sleeping in cars and RVs have been entirely outlawed. Under the new laws, it is illegal to sleep in a car or RV that is parked in a residentially zoned area from 9 p.m. to 6 a.m. Areas within one block of a park, daycare, or school are entirely off limits. Fines will range anywhere from $25 to $75 which is impossible to pay for most people in these situations. In 2014, LA lawmakers attempted to pass a similar bill but it was shot down in a federal appeals court. The judge in the case ruled that the legislation was “broad enough to cover any driver in Los Angeles who eats food or transports personal belongings in his or her vehicle. Yet it appears to be applied only to the homeless.” The policy is up for debate and reconsideration in July, where homeless advocates are expected to strongly protest for an appeal. Policies like this can have disastrous consequences, in Canada where laws like this have been implemented for some time, one man racked up over $110,000 worth of fines for essentially being homeless. Last year, The Mind Unleashed reported that the city of Seattle was planning to set up razor-wire fencing to keep homeless populations from camping. Then, earlier this year we reported that San Francisco was using Robots scare homeless people away from encampments and report them to police. Not soon after that, the city of San Francisco spent $8,700 installing large boulders under overpasses to prevent homeless people from setting up camps. There were numerous homeless encampments in the area until they were recently forced out of the area, and now the City’s government is doing everything they can to keep the camps out of the area.

- "National Security officials are prohibited from developing a factual understanding of Islamic threat doctrines, preferring instead to depend upon 5th column Muslim Brotherhood cultural advisors." — Richard Higgins, NSC official. - At the heart of the problem lies the fantasy that Islam must be very similar to other religions, particularly Judaism and Christianity, out of which it was, in fact derived. - The use of force, mainly through jihad, is a basic doctrine in the Qur'an, the Prophetic sayings (ahadith), and in all manuals of Islamic law. It is on these sources that fighters from Islamic State, al-Qa'ida, al-Shabaab, and hundreds of other groupings base their preaching and their actions. To say that such people have "nothing to do with Islam" could not be more wrong. ----- Recently, US National Security Advisor H.R. McMaster once again downplayed the significance of faith by claiming that Islamic ideology is "irreligious"; meanwhile, up to 1.5 billion Muslims continue claiming, as they have done for 1400 years, that it is. As Stephen Coughlin, an expert on Islam, told Gatestone, "It is the believers who define their religion, not the non-believers. If someone says his religion is that the moon is made of green cheese, that has to be your starting point." On February 20, 2017, President Trump appointed McMaster, a serving Lieutenant General of the US Army, to the important position of National Security Advisor, after the forced resignation of Michael T. Flynn. McMaster came to the post with a reputation for stability, battlefield experience, and intelligence. According to the Los Angeles Times: "It is not an overstatement to say that Americans and the world should feel a little safer today," tweeted Andrew Exum, an author and academic who saw combat in Afghanistan and writes widely about military affairs." After the controversies surrounding McMaster's predecessor in office, McMaster came as a safe hand. It was not long before divisions opened up within the NSC, however, with quarrels, firings, and appeals to the president. Many controversies remain today. By July, it was reported that Trump was planning to fire McMaster and replace him with CIA Director Mike Pompeo. By August, however, McMaster's position seemed secure. It is not the purpose of this article to discuss issues McMaster's spell at the NSC has brought to light, except for one: McMaster's position on Islam and terrorism. It became a cause for contention early in McMaster's incumbency and continues to engender divisions, not just among NSC staff, but also with the president. The general's viewpoint, which he has often expressed, is that international terrorism has nothing to do with the religion of Islam, a notion he seems to believe to the point where he has banned the use of the term "radical Islamic terrorism" -- a term that Trump uses often. In an all-hands meeting of the NSC on February 23, 2017, three days after his appointment as NSC Director, McMaster said jihadist terrorists are not true to their professed religion and that the use of the phrase "radical Islamic terrorism" does not help the US in working with allies to defeat terrorist groups: "The phrase is unhelpful because terrorist organizations like ISIS represent a perversion of Islam, and are thus un-Islamic, McMaster said, according to a source who attended the meeting." More recently, on December 3, in an interview with Fox News Sunday anchor Chris Wallace, McMaster stated that "we make sure we never buy into or reinforce the terrorist narrative, this false narrative that this is a war of religion". He followed this by elaborating on the criminality and supposed secularism of Muslim terrorists: "Those who adhere to this ideology are really irreligious criminals who use a perverted, what the President has called a wicked interpretation of religion, in an effort to recruit young, impressionable people to their cause, to foment hatred". In taking that stance, McMaster has broken with many members of his own staff, several of whom he was later to fire, and with the Trump administration itself. This desire to deny a connection between Islam and terrorism or to distinguish between a "pure" Islamic religion and "perversions" of it had been for many years a characteristic of the George W. Bush and Barack Obama administrations, as well as Hillary Clinton's tweets, when "this has nothing to do with Islam" was an oft-repeated refrain. One of the people whom McMaster fired is Richard Higgins, a top NSC official who had written a memoir in which he warned of the dangers of radical Islam and its alliance with the far Left. In a lengthy document, Higgins wrote: Globalists and Islamists recognize that for their visions to succeed, America, both as an ideal and as a national and political identity, must be destroyed...Islamists ally with cultural Marxists...[but] Islamists will co-opt the movement in its entirety... Because the left is aligned with Islamist organizations at local, national, and international levels, recognition should be given to the fact that they seamlessly interoperate through coordinated synchronized interactive narratives... These attack narratives are pervasive, full spectrum, and institutionalized at all levels. They operate in social media, television, the 24-hour news cycle in all media and are entrenched at the upper levels of the bureaucracies. Clearly, Higgins did not mince his words, yet what he wrote seems entirely appropriate for the NSC, a body charged with the protection of the United States from radicalism of all kinds. According to Meira Svirsky, writing for the Clarion Project Lamenting the lack of education given to government officials about radical Islam, Higgins previously wrote, "National Security officials are prohibited from developing a factual understanding of Islamic threat doctrines, preferring instead to depend upon 5th column Muslim Brotherhood cultural advisors." [1] Higgins's stress on the lack of education about Islam is a vital recognition that something has been going wrong for years when it comes to American and European official responses to the religion and its followers. Rightly cautious about genuine Islamophobia, the growth of hate speech and intercommunal strife, governments and their agencies have adopted policies and measures to preserve calm even in the face of growing levels of terrorism by Muslims. Europeans in Paris, Barcelona, Manchester, London, Brussels, Berlin and Nice, to name just a few places, are at the forefront of attacks inspired by Islamic State, al-Qa'ida and other radical groups. But the US has suffered the heaviest casualties, with thousands slaughtered in the 9/11 attacks. In the face of a renascent and at times violent Islam, politicians have adopted the policy of denying any connection between terrorist events and Islam. Many religious leaders have done the same. McMaster has adopted this policy, keeping him in line with established approaches: "HR McMaster, a respected army lieutenant general, struck notes more consistent with traditional counterterrorism analysts and espoused consensus foreign-policy views during a meeting he held with his new National Security Council staff on Thursday". According to Svirsky: McMaster believes the "Islamic State is not Islamic," going so far as to describe jihadists as "really irreligious organizations." As did former president Obama, he opposes use of any language that connects Islam to terrorism. McMaster also rejects the notion that jihadists are motivated by religious ideology. Instead, he says they are motivated by "fear," a "sense of honor" and their "interests," which he describes as the roots of human conflict for thousands of years. He believes U.S. policy must be based on "understanding those human dimensions." There may be signs that McMaster, though he still has some way to go, at least recognizes that some deeply religious Islamic organizations are a threat to the West. Writing on December 13, Meira Svirsky cites a speech McMaster gave at Policy Exchange in Washington: "Declaring the ideology of radical Islam an obvious and 'grave threat to all civilized people,' U.S. National Security Adviser General H.R. McMaster singled out the Muslim Brotherhood and its brand of political Islam as a specific threat". In that speech, the general spoke of Turkey and Egypt as two major sources of support for the Brotherhood, including its Palestinian branch, Hamas. He clearly sees the threat, but does not, as yet, fully understand the meaning of its religious dimension (however much other factors play a role in terrorism). I have no wish to be disrespectful towards McMaster, who carries out a vital task in securing the lives and property of so many Americans, but I fear his statements show that he has little or no knowledge of Islam, its teachings, or its history. Either that or he has invented a form of Islam that bears no resemblance to the religion that many of us have spent most of our lives studying. Not implausibly, he has given ears to advisors, possibly including Muslims, who have sought to play down any possible link between violence and the Muslim faith. This willingness, even eagerness, to misrepresent Islam plays directly into the hands of anti-Western Muslims, radicals who anticipate the coming of an apocalyptic global Caliphate. In a recent article, Professor Richard Landes of Boston University lists the many ways in which this is done: Only the most fervent of true believers could think that, even with Allah's help, the global Caliphate was possible. In order to succeed, da'wa [outreach; proselytizing] Caliphaters needed the assistance of the targeted kuffar population to: Disguise their ambition to subject the kuffar, by downplaying jihadi acts of war and their deployment among the targeted population. Insist that "except for a tiny minority," the "vast majority" of Muslims are moderate and peaceful, and Islam is a "Religion of Peace" that has nothing to do with the violence of jihadists. Accept those who fight for the Caliphate with da'wa as "moderates" who have "nothing to do" with "violent extremists." Engage these "moderate" Caliphaters as advisors and consultants in intelligence and police work, as prison chaplains, community liaisons, college teachers, and administrators. Present Caliphater war propaganda as reliable information, as news. Attack those who criticize Islam (including Muslims) as xenophobic and racist Islamophobes. Adopt the Caliphater's apocalyptic enemy as their own, so that the kuffar join in an attack on one of their key allies. Legitimate jihadi terrorism as "resistance" and denounce any recourse to violence in their own defense as "terrorism." Respect the dignity of Muslim beliefs even as Muslims heap disdain on their beliefs. Take seriously Caliphater invocations of human rights when, in reality, they despise those rights for women, slaves, and infidels. Welcome an angry "Muslim Street" in the heart of their capital cities. At the heart of the problem lies the fantasy that Islam must be very similar to other religions, particularly Judaism and Christianity, out of which it was, in fact derived. This would mean that Islam consists only of doctrines about a single God, heaven and hell, sin and punishment, spiritual endeavor, together with practices such as prayer, fasting, pilgrimage, and alms-giving. There would be nothing to concern us were that the case, and certainly no reason to connect the faith with a few supposedly fanatical people who have misguidedly distorted it and turned to violence. But that would be to ignore the totality of Islam. Apart from 12 years at the start of Muhammad's mission, Islam has encompassed far more than worship and moral behavior. From the moment Muhammad led his followers from Mecca to Medina in the year 622, his religion became a system of government, of law, and of war. Several battles were fought with his Meccan opponents; the Jews of Medina were either driven out by force or executed and enslaved, and Muhammad returned to Mecca as its conqueror. On his death, his first successor embarked on a two-year war to bring recalcitrant tribes back within the fold, sent out armies to the north and, in just a few years, began the wave of invasions that made Muslims victorious across most of the known world. Of the first four "rightly-guided" caliphs, one was assassinated by an Iranian captive and the other two by other Muslims. Muhammad's grandson, Husayn, was killed with his family in Karbala in 680 by the second of the Umayyad caliphs, before further internal wars. Jihadi wars continued, year in and year out, after that; they are still invoked by modern terrorists. Islam has never been at peace with the non-Muslim world. The use of force, mainly through jihad, is a basic doctrine in the Qur'an, the prophetic sayings (ahadith), and in all manuals of Islamic law. (For examples, see here, here, here and here.) If jihad were permitted only in self-defence, then excuses implying aggression, as we have seen, would need to be readily available to justify attacks. As the Washington Post wrote a fortnight after the attack on the United States on 9/11/2001: At the heart of the bin Laden opus are two declarations of holy war -- jihad -- against America. The first, issued in 1996, was directed specifically at "Americans occupying the land of the two holy places," as bin Laden refers to his native Saudi Arabia, where 5,000 U.S. troops have been stationed since the 1991 Persian Gulf War. The two holy places are Muslim shrines at Mecca and Medina. In 1998, he broadened the edict to include the killing of "Americans and their allies, civilians and military . . . in any country in which it is possible to do it." It is on such Islamic sources that fighters from Islamic State, al-Qa'ida, al-Shabaab, and hundreds of other groupings base their preaching and their actions. To say that such people have "nothing to do with Islam" could not be more wrong. It is not only wrong, it is demeaning to the many ex-Muslims such as Ayaan Hirsi Ali or Ibn Warraq and reformist Muslims who are fully aware of the connection, but are often apparently considered delusional or even fanatical. Last year saw the publication of Ibn Warraq's detailed study, The Islam in Islamic Terrorism: The Importance of Beliefs, Ideas, and Ideology, which takes the reader through all the violent or violence-promoting individuals and groups in Islamic history, with discursions on the thinking behind them. With few exceptions, these individuals and groups are far from minor or obscure. In chapter one of his book, Ibn Warraq examines what he calls the "Root Cause Fallacy", whereby politicians, security advisers, and others deflect attention from religion as a motivator for terrorism. He shows that most radicals and terrorists are not primarily inspired or justified by poverty, lack of knowledge of Islam, lack of education, the Arab-Israeli conflict, Palestine, anti-Semitism, U.S. Foreign policy, Western Imperialism, or revenge for the Crusades. He refers (p. 31) to David Wurmser of the American Enterprise Institute and his view that: "Westerners attribute too many of the Arab world's problems 'to specific material issues' such as land and wealth. This usually means a tendency 'to belittle belief and strict adherence to principle as genuine and dismiss it as a cynical exploitation of the masses by politicians. As such, Western observers see material issues and leaders, not the spiritual state of the Arab world, as the heart of the problem'". Overall, Ibn Warraq draws on an extensive body of scholarship, mainly from leading Western scholars of Islam and authoritative sources such as The Encyclopedia of Islam. McMaster and others, who repeat the mantra that Islamic terrorism has nothing to do with Islam, are hardly in a position to override comment by individuals who have spent a lifetime deeply involved in the study of Islam through its original sources. Ibn Warraq, moreover, cites (pp. 139-140) several Western and Muslim scholars who have said repeatedly that the idea that the "true jihad is a spiritual struggle" is completely unauthentic. It is arguments based on a reading of texts in Arabic, Persian, Urdu and other languages that deserve to be treated as the basis for policy-making, identifying which people may be potential terrorists, or evaluating the true intentions of US-based Muslim associations such as CAIR or ISNA. Clare Lopez, vice president of research and analysis at the Washington-based Center for Security Policy, has commented on the broad lack of knowledge about Islam and how it has distorted thinking within national bodies. Beginning with criticism of McMaster, she raises broader issues: McMaster is just wrong for NSC on so many counts. I think at least in part because, like others across national security at his level, who made rank in years post-9/11, he was systematically denied fact-based training about Islam, jihad, Shariah and the MB [Muslim Brotherhood] – whose affiliates, associates, operatives, fellow travelers and useful fools remain embedded within and close to the federal government and local law enforcement at various levels. Now, of course, anyone who's ever taken the oath to the Constitution has an affirmative obligation to know the enemy and that McMaster did not do this is his responsibility alone. Those who got promoted within the military-security establishment over the past eight years got there precisely because of a "willful blindness about Islam". The problem for the United States government, Congress, Senate -- and many important agencies which find themselves called on to discuss, monitor, report on, or make policies about Islam, American Muslims, Muslims worldwide, and more -- is knowing where to look for accurate and authentic information. In the past, all of these have depended on Muslim academics, uncritical and cosmetic non-Muslim professors and commentators such as John Esposito, Karen Armstrong and the many teachers identified by Campus Watch; numerous university and college Islamicists with vested interests in posts funded by Qatar, Saudi Arabia, and other Muslim states (see here); self-appointed Islamic authorities such as CAIR, and amateurs within US institutions. Criticism of Islam has become taboo and has been denounced as a right-wing or even far-right prejudice. The present writer, however, a political centrist, sees nothing wrong in bringing reasoned and fact-based criticism to bear on Islam, just as one would to every other ideology, from Marxism to Fascism. One can also appreciate the stunning contributions Muslims have made to science, art, architecture, calligraphy, music, and the spiritual endeavors of Sufis and Shi'i mystical philosophers. It is important for everyone to step back and bring accuracy and balance to the way we regard a large and expanding religion. Denis MacEoin has an MA in Persian, Arabic and Islamic History from Edinburgh University and a PhD (1979) in an aspect of Shi'i Islam in 19th-century Iran. He taught Arabic and Islamic Studies in the Religious Studies Department of Newcastle University and has published many books and articles on Islamic topics. ----- [1] There is evidence that the international Muslim Brotherhood is working for influence in US politics and that it has already placed people within several US bodies. See here.

Senior Chinese politician Yang Jing has been placed under investigation and suspended from his positions for having “long-term, inappropriate” relationships with illegal business owners, as well as using his position to conduct illegal activities and seek “huge profits,” Xinhua reported citing the Communist Party’s anti-corruption watchdog. His relatives are also said to have received bribes. Yang Jing held the offices of Central Committee secretary, state councilor and secretary general of the State Council. Yang Jing admitted the wrongdoings and apologized, the watchdog said.

Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte thinks he should be paid more. The Philippines leader argues that, because he has two wives, he should receive more money. Speaking at Camp General Adriano Hernandez in Iloilo on Thursday, Duterte said his salary wasn’t enough, and that it doesn’t include a food allowance, the Philippine Inquirer reports. “I get so tired and you know how much I earn? 200 [200,000 Philippine Piso, or $3860] I have two wives.” he said. “My ideal salary, if I would estimate it, I should be getting - no joke - one million, five hundred.” In 2016, former president Benigno Aquino signed an executive order to increase the salary schedule of civilian and military personnel. This is done through a four-year basic pay upgrade, Phil News reported. The president is on Salary Grade 33, making his 2018 monthly pay P298,083, [$5,753]. Duterte is due another salary increase next year, bringing his wages up to P399,739 [$7714] a month. Duterte has an ex-wife named Elizabeth Zimmerman who filed for annulment in 1998, reportedly due to Duterte’s cheating. The annulment came through in 2000. His current partner is Cielito Honeylet Avancena. “It’s very tiring, you keep on flying and saluting,” he said of his role as president, The Star reports. Duterte’s term as president will conclude in 2022.

The Olympic success of Norway’s skiing athletes has come under fire after a German investigative reporter accused some athletes of abusing their asthma medication to boost their medal haul. Norway’s Alpine skiers won a bronze medal in the inaugural team event in Pyeongchang on Saturday, adding to the country’s lead in the medal count with a total of 38. “It’s difficult to say why the performance has been way too good,” Norwegian Alpine skiing great Lasse Kjus told Reuters. Hajo Seppelt, a German journalist and documentary filmmaker on alleged state-sponsored doping in Russian sports, cast doubt on the ‘unexplained’ success, given the numbers of asthma meds brought to the Olympics by the Norwegian team. Just prior to the tournament, Norway announced that its delegation brought around 6,000 doses of asthma medication to treat national team members if they are diagnosed with the chronic respiratory disease. “In this case, the question clearly arises: is this not a question of abuse of medicines, and, after all, doping?” Seppelt asked in an interview with ARD while discussing a new documentary he made with Swedish national broadcaster SVT. In the documentary, Seppelt makes reference to a Danish study which confirms the “anabolic effect,” common in steroids, which some asthma drugs have on the human body. “This is an obvious loophole for people who want to use doping,” he said. Earlier this month, state-owned Norwegian broadcasting corporation NRK published a list of drugs taken to Pyeongchang by the Norwegian team doctor. It featured as many as 1,800 doses of Symbicort, 1,200 doses of Atrovent, 1,200 doses of Alvesco, 360 doses of Ventolin, and 1,200 doses of Airomir – which amounts to 10 times more asthma drugs than Norway’s neighbor Finland brought to the Games. In 2016, the debate over of Norway’s asthma drug use received media attention when a drug test of three-time Olympic medalist Martin Johnsrud Sundby revealed elevated levels of Beta-2 stimulator drug Salbutamol (also known as Ventolin.) While the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) allows 1,600 micrograms of Salbutamol per day, Sundby was caught taking 15,000 micrograms. The skier was deprived of his wins in the 2015 Tour de Ski and banned for two months for using a banned asthma drug, which was considered mild punishment by many critics. The Norwegian federation admitted the mistake after the ruling by the Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS). After being briefly banned from competing, Sundby, 33, returned to represent Norway at the 2018 Winter Olympics in South Korea, winning two golds and one silver. “It is common practice in Norway to occasionally use asthma medicine in major ailments in the respiratory system... even where the diagnosis of asthma is not specific,” Per Medboe Thorsby, head of the medical committee for Anti-Doping Norway, told Reuters in January. SVT reported earlier this month that since 1992, as many as 70 percent of Norwegian medals in Olympic skiing events were actually won by athletes diagnosed with asthma. It was also reported that beta-2 stimulators, prescribed to treat bronchial asthma, could help boost the muscle strength of athletes. Peter Kallings, a veterinary and doping expert for the International Riding Association, told SVT that clenbuterol, a drug containing the same active ingredients as salbutamol and other beta-2 stimulators, could produce an anabolic effect on horses. The use of Therapeutic Use Exemptions (TUEs) and asthma medicines in high endurance competitions is the subject of a years-long controversy. Under WADA guidelines, the use of asthma medicine is greenlighted if the dosage falls below a certain threshold. “Oral and injected beta-2 agonists are prohibited at all times,” the guideline reads.

It has been six years since the compound of Kim Dotcom (né Kim Schmitz), a Finnish-German dual national, was raided, north of Auckland, New Zealand. The official reason given was that his company, Megaupload, was facilitating criminal file-sharing of copyrighted movie and media files. Kim Dotcom is not a flawless figure. He was somewhat of a famous hacker in Europe, who had relocated to the South Pacific. Everyone who meets Kim, such as Steven Wozniak (8:25 – Campbell Live) seems to find him personable. What also comes across to the observant is that Kim is rather immature; he brags about his championship computer gaming skills. Kim does have a criminal record – mostly black-hat hacking – but he claims, with some validity, that the last charge of insider trading in Germany was bogus, and he merely took a plea deal. Kim was considered a flight risk and spent five months in jail before being offered probation and a small fine if he'd plead guilty. "I was just tired," Kim says. ... "So I took the deal. And there's nothing I regret more. Because if I hadn't pled, I wouldn't have had that 'career criminal' label. And I wouldn't be here today." His reputation preceded him, and the U.S. government paints him as a criminal mastermind rather than the hacking teenager who refused to grow up that he really is. Kim and his associates ran a site called Megaupload, an early version of cloud storage, which was used by many to upload and share copyrighted media. Hollywood was furious, but as a matter of fact, Megaupload was not the only website running such a storage system. Dropbox was started in 2007. In reality, Kim claims he worked with Hollywood to reduce piracy, and there seems to be some evidence of that. Yet, the company also appeared to follow many of the regular industry practices related to taking down infringing content when publishers requested it through what are known as takedown notices. At the time, Hollywood media moguls were still involved in a failing effort to get Congress to pass SOPA (the Stop Online Piracy Act), and Kim was portrayed as the major villain stealing Hollywood's profits. He became a poster boy for what was actually a worldwide phenomenon. Under such a spotlight, any mature businessman would have lain low, but Kim, with all the bravado of a 15-year-old, released a major internet commercial bragging about Megaupload, using famous music stars. Kim even gave himself a starring role in the video (starting at 1:23 and going for 30 seconds). It was like waving a red flag in front of Hollywood and the U.S. government. The video went viral. Soon after, Kim's compound was raided. https://youtu.be/7vg04JQs2so Kim was rubbing his success in Hollywood's face. What could one expect from a man who had luxury cars with vanity license plates like "God," "Mafia," and "Evil"? Okay, so Kim had never grown up – but does that mean he was guilty of such major pirating and money-laundering as the government claims? He certainly made himself an easy target. The Department of Justice alleges Dotcom together with Mathias Ortmann, Bram van der Kolk and Finn Batato were members of a worldwide criminal organization which engaged in copyright infringement and money laundering, costing copyright holders more than $500 million. The basic fact is that Kim Dotcom was doing only what other file storage platforms (see 7:03 at the link) were doing. Thus in terms of the timing and even in terms of the legal arguments, the U.S. government's attack on the website felt like it was acting as an arm of the recording industry and Hollywood. Why else go so heavy and so hard against Megaupload, with a case that to some experts seemed overblown. Presently, the U.S. government handling of the case has been so egregious that Kim has become sort of a hero standing up to a bully. The National Security Agency (NSA) illegally used technology to spy on Megaupload founder Kim Dotcom, according to new documents from New Zealand's Government Communications Security Bureau (GCSB). The raid on his house was over the top, as if Kim were Osama bin Laden. When videos of the raid hit the internet, people were outraged. The search warrants were invalid. The N.Z. government has admitted to illegally spying on Kim. Soon after the raid, Kim provided this major gem to the media, which seems to exonerate him. DotCom also brought up another interesting point during the interview. He said that while individual copyright owners had been critical of the service, not one major film studio or record company had ever filed suit against MegaUpload [sic] or even sent him a cease and desist letter. Megaupload's "Free" service plan was rather limited, and it had no easy search option. One couldn't just search for the newest movie release. And the 1GB limit was too small for a movie DVD. This was not a user-friendly service for those seeking to download movies. This was not like Napster. On TV, Kim added (6:50 at the link) that he allowed studios unfettered open access to his servers to remove links, which must have really been a humiliating admission for a former hacker. It has come out, as the government case is crumbling, that the government may charge Kim with sharing movie files among his partners. That's it? That may not be even actionable, if he bought the original DVD. Of course, now some American media outlets claim that New Zealand is fed up with Kim. How much of that is Hollywood spin is anyone's guess. If one goes to techie sites, or outside the loop of American media outlets, Kim Dotcom is still a techie rock star who has frustrated the U.S. government for years. Recently, under the pretext of Kim being a fugitive from justice, the U.S. Supreme Court has allowed the forfeiture of Kim's seized assets. But Kim is not running from anyone. He is fighting through the New Zealand court system. The U.S. Supreme Court on Monday rejected New Zealand-based internet mogul Kim Dotcom's challenge to the U.S. government's bid to seize assets held [outside the U.S.] by him. All of this raises a deep question. Who is looking more foolish: Kim or the U.S. government's prosecution? The New Zealand government has already admitted that copyright cases were not criminal under New Zealand law at that time. But if there was no copyright crime, where was the fraud? The money-laundering case may fall apart. While Kim still lives extravagantly, one of his associates, Finn Batato, the advertising manager, is living week to week in New Zealand. Finn is a tragicomic case. He flew in to New Zealand only for Kim's birthday party when the raid occurred. Had he remained in Europe, he would be a free man, as the Germans have refused to extradite Sven Echternach, another Megaupload associate. Finn has to work with a court-appointed defense attorney while he lives on a small allowance from a bank account frozen while the case goes on. Kim claims that this case was spurred on by Barack Obama just to please his Hollywood supporters, and he seems to have a good case. However, with the change of administration, the case has not been dropped. The Deep State runs deep. Kim Dotcom is not exactly a stellar hero in anyone's book. He is quite bombastic, albeit personable. However, the origin of this case, and its implementation, is so muddled that one wonders if Hollywood, and the U.S. government's handling of the case, is not far more embarrassing than anything Kim Dotcom did, if he did anything at all. He will never get a fair trial here in America. The case should be dropped, and Kim should be told to grow up. The U.S. government should leave Kim alone.

She nearly threw away the letter from the Colorado law firm, thinking it was junk mail. When she did open the letter, she was shocked to learn that she was being sued. The lawsuit stated that she was liable for downloading copyrighted music from the internet. She knew that her daughter had downloaded songs from a free web site called Limewire.com, but both she and her daughter believed that the downloads were legal. Few teenagers and fewer parents understand the issue of illegal file-sharing. This Clay Center family want to save others the expense and embarrassment they suffered and protect their privacy. They want to tell their story in hopes of helping someone else, but wish to remain anonymous. The Limewire web site is one of many Peer-to-Peer or P2P file-sharing networks. These networks serve as a means for many computers using the same software to connect and share files. The software is usually free, but even the versions that require a fee to join contain some files that are copyright protected. The problem is that any user of this type of network can upload files to the network unregulated. These files could be copyrighted materials or worse. The Federal Trade Commission, which is the nation's consumer protection agency, warns of several risks involved in using P2P networks. When connected to file-sharing programs, you could unknowingly allow others to copy private files you had no intention of sharing. You might download copyright protected materials, a computer virus, spy ware that tracks your private computer usage, or even pornography labeled as something innocent-sounding. There are good and legitimate uses for these networks in addition to sharing music or movies. Users can upload information they want to share with someone on the network, such as original musical compositions, photos, home videos, or even a power point presentation that would be too large to e-mail. Another user can then download that information. Some recording artists will place a low quality recording on P2P sites to introduce new material and create interest. Later, users can purchase a higher quality recording if they like the music. The record companies bringing the suit stated that her daughter had downloaded 179 songs in the course of a year. Not a lot. Many teenagers download thousands of songs in a year's time. The suit asked for $750.00 per song. After several phone calls, the mother was referred to a settlement company in Kansas City. The woman she spoke with said that it did not matter that she or her daughter believed the downloads were legal. When asked why they weren't only prosecuting people who were downloading high volumes, she was told that they are choosing users large and small at random, in an attempt to stop everyone. She consulted an attorney, who told her that her family should pay the $4,000.00 settlement offered. He told her that the chances were fairly high of paying a great deal more if the case went to court. The Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA) calls file sharing piracy and compares it to shoplifting. They are trying to educate the public about how the loss of sales affects everyone in the music industry from songwriters and sound engineers to record store clerks. They (the RIAA) do not make any concessions for people like her daughter who did not know she was doing anything wrong. They seem to make no differentiation between a conscious decision to shoplift and inadvertently copying files protected by a copyright which were placed on a P2P site by another individual member of the network. Because the networks are decentralized, they do not maintain control over the content that is shared and seem to be free from liability for illegal sharing of copyrighted materials. The Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) was founded in 1990 as a nonprofit organization which helps to defend free speech, privacy, innovation and consumer rights in the electronic world. The organization includes lawyers, policy analysts, activists and technologists who offer their expertise to policy makers, the press and the public. The EFF notes that broadcast radio faced some of the same problems with the music industry in its early days. The musicians believed radio was pirating their work at that time and attempted to sue broadcast radio out of existence. Eventually, they got together to form the American Society of Composers, Authors and Publishers (ASCAP), followed by Broadcast Music Incorporated (BMI) and the Society of European Stage Authors and Composers (SESAC). Radio stations pay a licensing fee and are allowed to play any and all music they choose on the equipment they choose. Each of these organizations collect the license fees and then distribute them back to the artists they represent. The EFF believes that a similar system would be the answer to the internet file sharing problem. Limewire's web site does offer copyright information, if users are careful to read it. It's a pretty good bet that few teenagers read all of the various instructions and information on a web site, but in the case of joining a file-sharing network, it would be a wise move. The RIAA folks are quick to remind that ignorance of the law is no defense. The Clay Center family learned a painful lesson about copyright law. Mom's mission now is to inform other teens and parents about music downloads. "Though there probably are sites where we could legally download some songs for free, we don't even go there. Now, if my daughter wants a song, we go to Walmart and pay 88 cents for it." If your family likes the convenience of downloading music from the internet, musicunited.org is a web site run by the recording industry. Along with information about copyrighted material, it has a list of sites where users can legally download music. The bottom line is that parents need to talk to their children about what they are downloading and the source they are using. The Music United site warns parents "....when you're on the Internet, digital information can seem to be as free as air. But the fact is that U. S. copyright law prohibits the unauthorized duplication, performance or distribution of a creative work. That means you need the permission of the copyright holder before you copy and/or distribute a copyrighted music recording."

A survey carried out on HDBits, one of the world's most exclusive private torrent sites, has revealed that even the most hardcore of pirates are happy to pay for content. The poll, carried out among more than 5,300 respondents, found that not only do 57% pay for streaming accounts on services like Netflix, Hulu or Amazon Prime, but 26% use those platforms more than they use torrent sites. Despite a notable move to unlicensed streaming portals, millions of people still use public torrent sites every day to obtain the latest movies and TV shows. The process is easy, relatively quick, and free. While these open-to-all platforms are undoubtedly popular, others prefer to use so-called ‘private trackers’, torrent sites with a private members’ club feel. Barriers to entry are much higher and many now require either an invitation from someone who is already a member or the passing of what amounts to an entrance exam. Once accepted as a member, however, the rewards can be great. While public sites are a bit of a free-for-all, private trackers tend to take control of the content on offer, weeding out poor quality releases and ensuring only the best reach the user. Seeders are also plentiful, meaning that downloads complete in the fastest times. On the flipside, some of the most exclusive trackers are almost impossible to join. A prime example is HDBits, a site that at last count wouldn’t accept more than 21,000 users yet keeps actual memberships down to around the 18,000 mark. Invites are extremely rare and those already inside tend to guard their accounts with their lives. Second chances are rare on a site indexing more than 234,000 high-quality releases seeded by more than 950,000 peers and one of the broadest selection of Blu-ray offerings around. That’s what makes the results of a survey currently being carried out on the site even more remarkable. In a poll launched by site staff, HDBits members – who by definition are already part of one of the most exclusive pirate haunts around – were asked whether they also pay for legal streaming services such as Netflix, Hulu or Amazon Prime. At the time of writing more than 5,300 members have responded, with a surprising 57% (3,036) stating that they do indeed subscribe to at least one legal streaming service. When questioned on usage, more than a quarter of respondents said they actually use the legal service MORE than they use HDBits, which for a site of that caliber is quite a revelation. HDBits poll – 57% of pirates pay for legal services Keeping in mind that the site is creeping towards a quarter of a million torrents and is almost impossible to get into, it’s perhaps no surprise that unscrupulous people with access to an invitation on the site are selling them (against the site’s wishes) for up to $350 each online. Let that sink in. For access to a pirate service, people are being asked to pay the equivalent of three years’ worth of Netflix subscriptions. Yet of those that are already members, more than a quarter use their Netflix, Hulu or Amazon Prime account more than they do HDBits. That’s a huge feather in the cap for the legal platforms that have nowhere near the selection that HDBits does. One commenter in the HDBits survey thread gave his opinion on why Netflix might be winning the war. “A thread several years ago like this was why I bought Netflix stock. Stunned not just that people here would actually pay for streaming 1 year old content in poor quality, but that almost everyone seemed to be doing it. If Netflix can win over [HDBits] then it is clearly a solution that will win over everyone,” he wrote. Of course, perhaps the most important thing here is that even the most hardcore pirates have no problem purchasing official content, when the environment is right. Unlike other surveys that can scare people away from admitting they’re breaking the law, most people on HDBits have nothing to hide from their peers. They know they’re pirates and aren’t afraid to admit it, yet almost 60% of them are happy to pay for legal content on top. Entertainment companies often like to put pirates in one box and legitimate customers in another. Once again it’s now being made clear that such neatly defined barriers aren’t easy to come by.

Disney has lost a bid to stop movie rental company Redbox from reselling download codes for its films. Redbox bought Disney movies on DVD to offer for rental in its kiosks. The DVDs were often bundled with a code to download a copy of the film. Disney requested an injunction to stop the practice, saying that Redbox had no business arrangement with it. A California federal judge accused Disney of "copyright misuse". Redbox rents and sells movies via tens of thousands of automated kiosks that dispense DVD and Blu-ray discs. It purchases retail copies of Disney movies that include a piece of paper printed with a digital download code, which Redbox then removes to resell in its own packaging. Disney said this constituted copyright infringement because the language on the packaging made it clear that codes were not for sale or transfer. In a 26-page order, Judge Pregerson said that the wording on the packaging did not create an enforceable contract. He also sided with Redbox's argument that Disney was misusing its copyrights by trying to restrict the reselling of copies of its movies after they had already been sold. The next hearing, on 5 March, will address Redbox's motion to dismiss the case.