Month: October 2024

Via Middle East Eye

Social media was abuzz after reports that the long-awaited video game Call of Duty: Black Ops 6 – which is being released Friday – will not be available in Kuwait. 

Reports that Kuwaiti authorities had blocked the release of the popular first-person shooter game days before its global launch on October 25 were confirmed by production studio Activision in a statement.

“Call of Duty: Black Ops 6 has not been approved for release in Kuwait. At this time, the title will not be available for release in [the] region,” Activision said. “As a result, all preorders in Kuwait will be cancelled and refunded to the original point of purchase. We remain hopeful that local authorities will reconsider, and allow players in Kuwait to enjoy this all-new experience in the Black Ops series.”

Set during the first Gulf War, Black Ops 6 is the newest entry in the Call of Duty franchise, and revolves around a clandestine force infiltrating the CIA.

The trailer for the game opens with clips of former US President George W Bush saying: “The Soviet Union is no more,” followed by a series of archival footage interspersed with digitally altered footage and shots of historic figures including Bill Clinton, Margaret Thatcher and Saddam Hussein.

While no official reason was given by Kuwaiti authorities, social media users speculated that the backdrop of the war, which began with Iraq’s invasion of Kuwait in 1990, was the reason behind the ban.

Middle East Eye contacted Kuwaiti officials for comment, but did not receive a response by the time of publication. “Interesting to see how political sensitivities influence entertainment,” one user posted on the decision. 

“I could see them going for a ‘monster of their own doing’, essentially framing Saddam [Hussein] as a byproduct of unchecked US support towards western friendly dictatorships and US willingness to sell the chemical precursors to Iraq’s chemical weapons program during the Iran-Iraq war,” one Redditor shared, as gamers tried to guess what could have led to the launch delay.

“I want to see how they’re going to capture the story. Will it be the real version or will they – as usual – make one up, portraying themselves as the heroes saving the world?” one Saudi gamer said on TikTok.

Kuwait has banned the upcoming Call of Duty: Black Ops 6 over “progressive propaganda” as the video game features Saddam Hussein and the first Gulf War. Curious. pic.twitter.com/r6rhSAWLfS

— Ian Miles Cheong (@stillgray) October 20, 2024

One gaming analyst told the New Arab: “The move to block this game may seem theatrical because people will find ways to buy this game if they really want it, whether via VPN or pay a premium price in the black market. What’s more interesting here is the motivation of the authorities to block a game set in what was a traumatic period for Kuwait – the Gulf War.”

“Kuwait, to this day, has difficulty engaging with that specific moment in history, for good or ill,” he added. 

The Gulf War remains a deeply sensitive chapter in Kuwaiti history, with the effects still felt today. Under then-president Saddam Hussein, Iraq invaded the country with around 100,000 troops in hopes of controlling its vast oil resources. 

The war lasted for 42 days, with a US-led coalition of 42 countries forcing Iraqi troops out of Kuwait, while carrying out an intense bombing campaign on Iraqi units in Iraq and Kuwait.

An estimated two million landmines are believed to have been placed in Kuwait at the time, and reports indicate that the country’s desert areas “remain contaminated with landmines and unexploded ordnance”, affecting and killing civilians to this day.  

Images of burning oil fields in the COD trailer are reminiscent of how Iraqi troops set fire to some 700 wells, causing a massive ecological and economic blow to the country.

This is not the first time the franchise has faced controversy or been banned in countries. Call of Duty: Modern Warfare II included a mission targeting an Iranian military leader named “Ghorbrani” – one very similar to the real-life assassination of Iranian general Qassem Soleimani, which drew criticism online.

In 2021, Activision came under fire for a scene in Call of Duty: Vanguard’s Zombies, in which pages from the Quran, the Islamic holy book, were scattered on the floor. At the time, many social media users called for a boycott of the game, which they called Islamophobic. The US-based studio issued an apology and removed the content.

Chinese EV battery maker SVOLT is shuttering operations in Europe on the heels of a yearslong regulatory conflict between European lawmakers and EV manufacturing based in China.

As we have reported over the last year, EU authorities have been doing everything in their power to stifle EV production based in China, fearing that the lower cost models coming from the east are warping the European market and putting domestic producers at a disadvantage.

Now, the consequences are starting to rear their heads. Chinese EV battery maker SVOLT Energy plans to shut its European operations by January 2025, in a move that clearly points to China’s retreat from the market – and declining EV sales in Europe, according to Nikkei. 

SVOLT, linked to Great Wall Motor, will close its German subsidiaries and lay off staff, according to a source.

Poor EV sales and financial pressures have driven Chinese battery maker SVOLT to shut all of its European operations, including its Frankfurt office, according to the same report.

The Nikkei report says that all SVOLT Europe employees will be laid off, though some were recently offered positions at the company’s China headquarters. The exact number of affected staff remains unknown, and SVOLT has not commented on the matter.

In 2020, SVOLT announced plans to invest €2 billion in two battery plants in Germany’s Saarland, creating up to 2,000 jobs. However, it halted plans for a plant in Lauchhammer due to losing a key customer and concerns over tariffs and subsidies.

A lawsuit and local protests have also delayed a planned factory in Ueberherrn until 2027. SVOLT’s Heusweiler plant, intended to produce battery packs, was set to open in July, but reports suggest the company has now ceased all production in Germany.

Meanwhile, just like in the U.S., the EV market in Europe is cooling. New car sales in the EU dropped 18% in August, with Germany down 28%, according to the European Automobile Manufacturers’ Association. EV market share fell 44%, with Chinese brand BYD selling only 218 cars in Germany, or 0.1% of the country’s EV sales.

SVOLT, spun off from Great Wall Motor in 2018, counts Geely Auto, XPeng, and Great Wall among its clients but has struggled financially, reporting a cumulative loss of 4.4 billion yuan ($618 million) from 2019 to 2022.

The company aimed to raise $2.1 billion through a Shanghai IPO in 2022 but abandoned the plan a year later.

Authored by John Leake via ‘Courageous Discourse’ substack,

Ursula von der Leyen advocates “pre-bunking” in the public forum to “vaccinate” people against “disinformation”…

Von der Leyen Promises to ‘Vaccinate’ EU Population Against ‘Wrong Thinking’

According to Ursula, who is currently facing a criminal case over the EU government’s strange contracts with pharmaceutical companies , people in society who hold views that contradict the globalist… pic.twitter.com/fK0wKV6tUQ

— “Sudden And Unexpected” (@toobaffled) October 22, 2024

EU President Ursula von der Leyen just joined the ranks of former Senator John Kerry and other globalist ghouls in declaring war on free speech by perversely proclaiming that the EU citizenry needs to be “vaccinated against disinformation.”

Like every censor in history, she characterizes her censorship program as a means of expunging erroneous information and ideas from public discourse. By using the word “disinformation,” she implies that she and her clique are already the sole possessors of the truth about everything, and that everyone who has and shares heterodox ideas is necessarily in error.

Her entire premise is FALSE for the following reasons:

1). Knowledge about the world is constantly evolving through constant inquiry, discussion, and dissemination. Knowledge is NOT a static thing. This is why countries with stifling censorship regimes have experienced intellectual, scientific, and artistic stagnation. Their rulers try to freeze the human mind in its state at their moment in history.

2). NO state, university, or ecclesiastical committee has ever been in possession of the full truth of any matter. Official orthodoxies have always been challenged by heterodox thinkers. Indeed, virtually every major advance in human insight has been performed by heterodox thinkers.

3). As John Milton observed in his 1644 pamphlet, Areopagitica, contending with error is an intrinsic part of learning and discovery. We literally learn by making mistakes and correcting them. If free speech is suppressed for the objective of preventing the propagation of erroneous thought—or “vaccinating against it”—it will become extremely difficult if not impossible for people to learn and discover.

4). Without a single exception in history, the people who hold power always advocate the orthodoxy that sustains and extends their power and that of their friends and supporters.

Ursula von der Leyen is the quintessence of this principle.

As president of the EU, she conducted secret negotiations with Pfizer CEO to purchase a 20 billion Euros of Pfizer’s fraudulent and dangerous vaccine so that it could be inflicted on all the citizens of the European Union.

She is currently under criminal investigation for her conduct in this affair that has come to be known as Pfizergate.

It takes a special kind of chutzpah for a powerful state official who is probably guilty of committing a major crime – a crime that has been systematically and ruthlessly concealed – to lecture the public about the need for censorship.

The time has come for the citizens of Europe to rid themselves of Ursula von der Leyen and her clique of corrupt tyrants.

To be sure, there is increasing evidence that the Biden Administration has been exerting pressure on Germany – which remains an American vassal state – and the EU to step up its censorship regime. I will cover this strange development in a subsequent post.

Mexico City has been named the world capital of cocktails, with the famed Handshake Speakeasy bar taking the top spot in ‘The World’s 50 Best Bars 2024‘ by William Reed.

As Statista’s Anna Fleck reports, the annual roundup is based on the votes of more than 600 industry experts from around the world, from bartenders and cocktail connoisseurs to consultants, critics and drinks reviewers.

The podium is completed by Bar Leone, in Hong Kong, and Sips in Barcelona, the latter of which took the top spot last year.

You will find more infographics at Statista

The highest ranked US bars are Double Chicken Please, in New York City (at 14th)…

…and Overstory (also in NYC) at 15th on the list.

Authored by T.L.Davis via Substack,

One can roll all of the majority of grievances into one basic event, the government stepping on the snake. The famous Gadsden Flag of “Don’t Tread On Me,” a warning to the Brits to mind their own affairs, or they might get bitten, is a favorite of the patriots against the decades-long process of violating their rights. It’s a warning revived during the Tea Party days, now fifteen years hence. But they have been stepping on them.

What the US Government loves to do, is step on the snake; to grind it into the ground and since 1787, they have not been bitten. It’s our responsibility to future generations to retaliate for the injustices of our time. Each generation has a duty, as I see it, to deliver the nation to the next generation with a full compliment of rights and freedoms.

In that endeavor, we have thus far failed, but a new day dawns.

It’s difficult to imagine the depth and width of patriotic zeal that has slowly been eroded over the past few centuries, but it is a great reservoir that the current regime continues to draw on to inflict mass casualties on the people without significant backlash. This is largely due to a misunderstanding of loyalty.

The government likes to project symbols as the objects of loyalty, while eroding freedoms in darkness. So they shine a bright light on the flag “Old Glory,” as it’s sometimes called, that represents the past obedience of the government to its charter, the U.S. Constitution. In the meantime, they have hollowed out that document by ignoring it all along the way, from Executive Branch expansion as a means of doing a backward illegality that is the purview of congress, i.e., all spending bills have to originate in the House. But if the Executive Branch creates FEMA or the EPA, it becomes incumbent on congress to fund it with the excuse that they could simply defund it, should it get out of control. Well, that’s exactly what’s happened over and over again, except the House doesn’t have the political will to stand up for the people and defund anything. They have been terrorized by the bureaucrats that give example after example of bad things that they will be blamed for if they defund a single thing.

They like to shine a bright light on the capitol building and the Washington Monument, even the White House to appeal to patriotism, while none of those things function as intended. During the whole of the Biden Administration, the Executive Branch has run itself. The DOJ doesn’t worry about committing crimes, because who is going to hold it accountable? FEMA and the border patrol fall under their purview as well as the FBI. No one can hold them accountable, but they can defund them. Our congress, who has oversight, has been unwilling to restrain its excesses.

All of this is a challenge to patriots to do something about it, knowing that whatever they might do will be cast as an attack on the flag, the congress or the cynically termed “democracy.” We saw that on January 6th. It had a chilling effect on the right to assemble and petition for a redress of grievances as intended. The constitutional right violates the security of the corrupt government and is suddenly deemed unpatriotic, an insurrection, rather than what it was, a right to petition the government to correct an openly and arrogantly stolen election.

The point is, the government will fight back with everything it has to keep the people enslaved to their bastardization of the constitution and the denial of rights of the people. It takes a brave population to shrug off those charges, repudiate the “unpatriotic” theme with action, but look at what’s been endured since January 6th, 2021 and you’ll understand the lengths to which they will go and the methods by which you can operate.

First, don’t give them a timeline, or an opportunity to infiltrate. The very existence of opposition assembly arises from Obama and sending SEIU out to do his bidding against those who protested Obamacare. I know, I was there, I saw it, including the buses and the sign-in sheets by which these public servants were paid for their time to counter unpaid, patriotic, citizen-organized protests. This is a tactic that has been used over and over with Antifa and BLM in later-stage government’s attacks on freedom of speech and the right to assemble.

Anytime the government sponsors or pays counter-protesters, it is a violation of the First Amendment. Simple as that. They are acting unlawfully. To counter all of this, the people must be much more aware of their rights and especially the law with the willingness to report such crimes to the Sheriff or DA of the jurisdiction. That, specifically, is in violation of 18 USC 41 Conspiracy against rights, where any two people gathered to deny any right, in this case, intimidate you from exercising one’s right to petition the government for a redress of grievances through fear for one’s safety, they have committed a crime. One can tell the difference by where the “counter protesters” are placed. If it is within sight and sound of original protesters, the right has been violated.

This all points to one ultimate conclusion. If the government is invested in denying any right of the people, it actually serves as an injury for which consequences can be expected. That is the justification, the act in defense of the constitution that defeats their claims of “unpatriotic acts.” In order to be unpatriotic, one has to be defying the constitution, not the illegal actions of the government itself. Denying that criticism, through counter-protestors or censorship of social media is in violation of the law.

While I admit this all sounds like official gobbledegook that has no weight or stamina in a corrupt court, it is. But I’m not arguing the law, but the justification for consequences for stepping on the snake. Getting one’s mind right for the upcoming festivities is as important as any other preparation. It will endure one during hard times knowing that despite what the captured media might say, they acted rightfully and legally in the eyes of compatriots. This was the preparatory work not done prior to January 6th.

There will be another January 6th, they’re begging for it and will, like then, create it, if it won’t be brought to them wrapped in shiny paper and a ribbon. The response, unlike then, must be a full-throated denunciation and demand for the real criminals to be exposed.

Views expressed in this article are opinions of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of ZeroHedge.

A world map showing the most common origins of immigrants by country reveals some prolific immigrant nations as well as the influence that conflict and economic collapse can have on migration patterns.

As Statista’s Katharina Buchholz reports, the most common pattern around the world is neighbors providing the most immigrants to one another.

This is for example the case in the U.S. and Mexico, which are the biggest source of immigrants to each other.

It is the same between Albania and Greece or Honduras and El Salvador, for example.

You will find more infographics at Statista

This is based on data from the United Nations Population Division.

This pattern is disrupted however, when many people leave their country at the same time due to conflict, war or poverty. Venezuelan immigrants are now the largest group in nine neighboring countries, while six neighbors of the Democratic Republic of the Congo have taken in large groups of their citizens.

For Somalia, its five neighbors.

Ukrainian immigrants as of 2020 already were the biggest group in four neighboring nations, equal to Syria and Bosnia and Herzegovina.

Then there are also those nations which are known to send immigrants all over the world, not just in their direct neighborhood. Among them are India and China, with their citizens being the largest group of immigrants in neighboring nations as well as on the Arabian Gulf in the case of India and in Canada and Australia in the case of China.

In Europe, Poland is the most prominent nation of emigration, with Poles being the largest group of immigrants in the United Kingdom, Germany and some Scandinavian nations.

Only a handful of countries have a more unique major immigration partner that is not their neighbor. These instances are often tied to colonialism.

The biggest immigrant group in Equatorial Guinea and Morocco are from France, while for the Netherlands it is Suriname, for Portugal Angola, for France Algeria, for Cuba Spain and for New Zealand the United Kingdom.

By Tsvetana Paraskova of OilPrice.com

Increased use of natural gas for power generation has made the United States more dependent on fossil fuels for its electricity supply this year than China, the world’s top carbon emitter.

Since June 2024, high U.S. summer electricity demand has been mostly met by increased gas-fired power generation, while a rebound in hydropower in China has limited to some extent the share of coal in its electricity supply.

As a result, fossil fuels – including natural gas and coal – have had an average share of 62.4% of total electricity output in the United States since June. This compares to a lower fossil fuel share in the coal-dominated power system in China, where fossil fuels accounted for 60.5% of generation between June and September, according to data from energy think tank Ember reported by Reuters columnist Gavin Maguire.

The rise in natural gas power output could undermine the current U.S. goals of making the grid zero-carbon by 2035.

U.S. power generation from natural gas surged by 20% in the first nine months of 2024, compared to the same period of 2019. The share of gas in power supply has jumped to 43% from 38% five years ago.

In recent years, power demand in the United States, the single largest portion of which is delivered by gas-fired power plants, has soared and is expected to continue to surge with rising electrification and more electricity necessary to power and cool data centers.

U.S. power-generating companies are announcing plans for the highest volume of new natural gas-fired capacity in years as the AI boom is driving demand for electricity.

During the first half of 2024, electricity-generating firms unveiled plans for the new gas-powered capacity equal to all capacity announced in 2020, according to data from Sierra Club cited by Bloomberg last month.

Natural gas-fired electricity generation in the United States has jumped year-to-date compared to the same period last year, as total power demand rose with warmer temperatures and demand from data centers.

Today’s daters are taking matters into their own hands. Seemingly no longer satisfied with the potential partners that life throws at them at work, in school and in their circle of friends, Statista’s Katharina Buchholz details below that an increasingly large number of heterosexual daters is opting to meet their partner online.

Surveys carried out and analyzed by Stanford University show that between 1995 and 2017 the number of heterosexuals who met their partner on the internet rose sharply from 2 percent to 39 percent.

You will find more infographics at Statista

With the help of dating apps like Tinder and eHarmony, but also through social networking sites like Facebook, daters reconnected with old friends and acquaintances (8 percent of couples who met online), were introduced to someone (11 percent) or – in the majority of cases – met someone completely new on their own (81 percent).

The authors of the survey concluded that the main draw of looking for a stranger online was a larger set of choices than when leveraging friends and family, which was especially useful when “searching for something unusual or hard‐to‐find.“

In a similar vein, meeting your partner in a bar or restaurant was also on the rise between 1995 and 2017.

Stanford researchers excluded homosexuals from their analysis because they constitute a minority sexual orientation, making meeting someone online a more obvious choice for them than for heterosexuals.

These were usually in a “thick dating market” (quote from Stanford) and therefore normally also able to identify several potential mates in their offline lives, according to the research.

Via SchiffGold.com,

A simple internet search confirms the overwhelming buzz in the air: Americans across the board are more concerned with the economy than any other political issue.

This concern is overwhelming across both aisles, seems to be growing, and has remained a large issue for years. Recent polling data shows that when combined, concern about inflation & prices, and jobs & the economy create a supergroup that more than doubles any other individual worry. While party lines are more rigid than we would like to believe, it seems as though a candidate who embraced this fear and found a solution could have absurdly high mass appeal.

While both presidential candidates have seen the recent trends and more strongly espoused their economic plans, it seems almost impossible to focus on the economy too much. While the lack of overwhelming emphasis on economic issues might seem like a simple misunderstanding between politicians and citizens, the root of high inflation and economic uncertainty is much more linked to voter’s own desires than they would ever want to believe.

Citizens, whose actively informed assent is supposed to be one the primary bases of government, have an odd habit of wanting the best for themselves. The declaration’s explicit promotion of our right to “life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness” has created a foundational belief that anything short of thriving is not fulfilling the promise of America.​​ While what it means to thrive is defined differently by person, most Americans believe that our access to material goods, pleasures, and freedom from worry should be constantly growing. While this desire is not unique to Americans, the state’s embrace of its role as a servant makes us less skeptical of politicians who promise to give national success in every area. We only apply strong scrutiny to the high-flying claims of the opposing sides’ candidates because we believe that the high-flying promises of our own candidates are merely necessary to the fulfillment of their duty. While in many countries all politicians are more obviously known to be self-seeking charlatans, our institutions’ relative freedom from corruption have allowed us to live under the illusion that we are always one president away from “getting it right.”

This desire creates an endless loop where candidates who do not paint a rosy picture of the future lose favor with the public. While the American political and economic system has created unprecedented human thriving, our desire to select candidates who claim to “do it all” is the root cause of our economic woes. 

It may seem fatalistic to claim that positive and multi-focused candidates are the problem. There is nothing inherently wrong with having a diverse policy agenda, but the short term cycle of elections necessitates that plans will skew towards the near future. It is possible to have less inflation, more economic growth, and less taxes, but not immediately. The best that a candidate can hope for is to time everything right so that all the key metrics of economic success are most appealing in the months leading up to their hopeful reelection. People cling to the idea that we can fix all of our problems without associated pain or adjustment periods. We must embrace willing restraint from indulgence if we are to secure the free and prosperous future we dream of. Candidates fuel our ignorant belief that we can be reckless in the present without sacrificing the future, because they know they will be able to escape blame for a collapse that comes many years after they leave office. This negative cycle is not a direct result of our electoral process, or even of the candidates themselves.

This cycle is allowed to continue because of the economic ignorance and low impulse control of voters.

We damn our children by choosing to maximize our own comfort, not fully understanding how it will affect them, or even ourselves in 15 years. 

We will not be able to escape this cycle until basic economic principles are more rigorously taught in schools. When forced to choose between two big-spending candidates, choosing the candidate who creates freer market conditions will always be the better choice, because that type of unpredictable and rapid growth can sustain far more spending than the tepid stagnation of a wannabe command economy. While the choice is obvious, it is far from a safe choice. The candidates are not the problem, rather, they are a reflection of our desires. Our desires and understanding must be formed through our upbringing and education in a way that will allow us to cut through empty promises and simplistic hedonism. Wanting low prices, low taxation, a healthy military and a strong healthcare system is natural, but we must be wise enough to know that those things must come slowly.

Fiscal responsibility is boring and painful, but it is the only way to simultaneously secure “life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.”

Israel attacked Iran early Saturday morning local time with what it’s referred to as “precise strikes on Iranian military targets,” weeks after the Islamic Republic fired around 180 ballistic missiles towards Israel on Oct. 1. Blasts were reported near the headquarters of the Iranian Revolutionary Guard.

In a rare announcement, the Israeli military said its strikes are underway, and that their “offensive and defensive capabilities are fully mobilized,” while the WSJ reports that Israel gave the US advance notice.

“We were aware in advance,” said a US official.

IDF DECLARES OFFENSIVE AGAINST IRAN pic.twitter.com/X6Na7X9uYu

— The_Real_Fly (@The_Real_Fly) October 25, 2024

According to unconfirmed reports, several explosions have been heard in Tehran. According to journalist Reza Rashidpour, five large explosions were heard in the city within around 10 seconds, while Iranian Air Force jets have taken off in the western part of the country, the NY Times reports.

Huge explosions in Tehran! pic.twitter.com/sMQoPdB7JI

— Israel News Pulse (@israelnewspulse) October 25, 2024

According to the Times: 

Residents of Tehran reported hearing multiple explosions in and around the Iranian capital, and Iranian state media sites said the explosions were near or at Imam Khomeini international airport.

Maryam Naraghi, an Iranian journalist, said she heard large explosions in the eastern part of Tehran, where she lives. “It was the sound of bombs and explosions,” she said. “It was very close to where I am in the eastern part of the city.” The area includes military bases and the secretive military site Parchin.

Another Iranian journalist, Reza Rashidpour, said five massive explosions were heard in Tehran within about 10 seconds. He said Iranian air force jets had taken off in the western part of the country.

Iranians have also reported hearing explosions in Isfahan, Mashhad, and Kurdistan province, while two senior Arab officials told NBC News that the initial strike on Tehran targeted barracks and a weapons depot.

Israeli planes crossed the Syrian-Jordanian border towards Iraq pic.twitter.com/WWDiG9x1Lj

— S p r i n t e r (@SprinterFamily) October 25, 2024

#BREAKING: Sirens are wailing in Tehran. pic.twitter.com/5T6JD1P4j7

— Clash Report (@clashreport) October 25, 2024

Tehran has threatened to target Gulf states and other US allies if their territories or airspace are used to attack Iran – while Israel assured the US that it wouldn’t strike Iran’s oil or nuclear facilities.

As Axios reports, US and Israeli officials believe Iran will respond military – but hope it will be ‘constrained’ in order to put an end to the tit-for-tat (ok).

Driving the news: The U.S. military boosted its forces in the region in the last few weeks ahead of Israel’s possible attack on Iran.

• U.S. officials said the goal was to deter Iran from responding and help Israel defend itself from another Iranian missile barrage.
• President Biden and Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin decided to deploy a THAAD missile defense system in Israel with a crew of U.S. military operators.
• That means U.S. soldiers could actively engage in the fighting between Israel and Iran on Israeli soil.
• On Friday, several hours before the Israeli strike, CENTCOM announced that U.S. Air Force F-16s from the 480th Fighter Squadron based at Spangdahlem Air Base in Germany had arrived in U.S. Central Command’s area of responsibility.

Meanwhile, the FBI is investigating a leak of top secret US intelligence documents that revealed part of Israel’s upcoming strike on Iran.