Israel

• Pope urges Putin to make 'sincere, great effort' for Ukraine peace (Reuters)
• Merkel Tells Tsipras It’s Time to Back Talk With Policy Action (BBG)
• 'Greek tragedy' needs happy ending now: EU's Moscovici (Reuters)
• Vulture Funds Circle Greece Targeting Europe’s Best Trading Bet (BBG)
• Germany against third aid program for Greece under any circumstances, says daily (Reuters)
• Biggest OPEC Members Pump Record Oil With Rally in Jeopardy (BBG)
• Greek ruling reversing pension cuts will cost state 1 to 1.5 bln euros (Kathimerini)
• China’s Former Security Chief Zhou Yongkang Sentenced to Life in Prison (WSJ)
• MSCI backs itself into corner on China share inclusion (Reuters)

"U.S. President Barack Obama is weighing steps to bolster Iraq's battle against Islamic State," Reuters says, as senior military officials indicate an increase in the number of US "support personnel" may be necessary. Meanwhile, Congressional war hawks are beating the drum.

While Obama is currently under fire for stating at the recently concluded G-7 summit in Germany that the US "does not yet have a complete strategy" how to deal with ISIS, the reality as relates to the true US strategy, namely the ouster of Syria's president al Assad, could not be more different. Because while ISIS continues to deflect attention from what is really happening in the middle east, the noose around Syria's Assad is tightening one day at a time, with the latest blow coming overnight after Syrian "rebels", also supported by the US (and allowed to call in B-1B strikes), scored a major military victory capturing the second biggest Syrian army base in the south of the country, located in the city of Deraa near the border with Jordan, and just 100 km south of Damascus.

in a follow up piece to his stunning original investigative report, Nafeez Ahmed reveals that according to leading American and British intelligence experts, the previously declassified Pentagon report confirms that the West accelerated support to extremist rebels in Syria, despite knowing full well the strategy would pave the way for the emergence of the ‘Islamic State’ (ISIS). The experts who have spoken out include renowned government whistleblowers such as the Pentagon’s Daniel Ellsberg, the NSA’s Thomas Drake, and the FBI’s Coleen Rowley, among others. Their remarks demonstrate the fraudulent nature of claims by two other former officials, the CIA’s Michael Morell and the NSA’s John Schindler, both of whom attempt to absolve the Obama administration of responsibility for the policy failures exposed by the DIA documents.

We previously warned of the risks of escalation in The Middle East to something much more dangerous, but, as the Saudi ambassador to UK confirmed today, the risk of Wahhabis going nuclear is even higher than many expected, "...if [Iran will not offer assurances it will not pursue nuclear weapons], then all options will be on the table for Saudi Arabia... Iran’s nuclear program poses a direct threat to the entire region and constitutes a major source and incentive for nuclear proliferation across the Middle East, including Israel."

If you think the corporate-fascist state is overbearing and oppressive now, you ain’t seen nothing yet.

• China stocks fall, led by ChiNext, on margin tightening; Hong Kong down too (Reuters)
• Bond market sell-off rumbles on, stocks feel the pinch (Reuters)
• Bond Rout Wipes Out 2015 Gains as Traders Stay Glued to Screens (BBG)
• Greek Groundhog Day Continues With Talks Failing to Break Impasse (BBG)
• Greece and Its Creditors Agree on Some Measures in Bailout Talks (WSJ)
• 'Bellingcat Report Doesn't Prove Anything': Expert Criticizes Allegations of Russian MH17 Manipulation (Spiegel)
• GE Said to Hire Banks to Start Sale on $20 Billion Assets (BBG)
• Alibaba Pictures plans $1.6bn share sale (FT)
• How Companies Justify Big Pay Raises for CEOs (BBG)

Hint...

Curious how and why the US is "boosting" US GDP by selling over $4 billion worth of weapons to Israel, Iran and Saudi Arabia, ostensibly to provide these countries with protection against ISIS (the same ISIS, incidentally, which a leaked document last week admitted had been effectively created by the US)?  Simple: by first "losing" a billion dollars worth of Humvees so that, drumroll, ISIS can be the best-armed "terrorist" force in the middle east, a force whose mere presence will demand billions in subsequent military orders from the US military-industrial complex by all those who are threatened by ISIS.

Those men who wrote our Constitution made it perfectly intelligible to anyone who cared to read it. They also left some flexibility in its articles to ensure that as time passed and circumstances changed the document would remain viable as the indispensable protector of the republic they created and of the liberty of citizens. In recent decades, however, Americans have been treated to an endless stream of politicians, academics, lawyers, and pundits who describe the opaqueness of the Founder’s Constitution and the need for “experts” to decipher or infer what the document means. But their words are lies, there are no such things as universal values. There is only one value common to all men in all times and that is the universal lust for gaining and exercising arbitrary power, and that power is exactly what the Jacobin/Neocon crowd is after.

In Part 1 of “The New Silk Road,” we examined the China’s plan for rebuilding the Silk Road, stretching from Europe to Asia. In Part 2, we look at currently proposed projects, and geopolitical rivalries that could stall and hamper progress. Until very recently, it was widely assumed that the US would lead its western allies in a campaign against the Russian/Chinese deal to develop the Silk Road, but events have been reversing with remarkable speed.

In real democracies, governments would do what the citizens who put them in office want them to do. The United States and other Western democracies make a mockery of that ideal. But, even so, there are limits; governments cannot defy public opinion on matters of great moment indefinitely. Enabling the Saudi ruling class, and the rulers of the other Gulf states, to direct American foreign policy to the extent that they do, and to get away with whatever they please, is hardly the least of it; but neither is it the only cause for concern.

Israel is refusing to comply with an order by a Swiss court that it pay $1.1 billion that it has owed to Tehran since before Iran’s 1979 Islamic revolution for its share of a jointly owned oil pipeline. “Without referring to the matter at hand, we’ll note that according to the Trading with the Enemy Act it is forbidden to transfer money to the enemy, including the Iranian national oil company,” the Israeli Finance Ministry said in a statement.

This won't end well... As far as the Empire of Chaos goes, Divide and Rule remains the sweetest game in town.

The revelation from an internal US intelligence document that the very US-led coalition supposedly fighting ‘Islamic State’ today, knowingly created ISIS in the first place, raises troubling questions about recent government efforts to justify the expansion of state anti-terror powers.