Posted on June 11, 2017 June 11, 2017

ICE Newark arrests 113 criminal targets in 5-day enforcement surge

June 11,2017

the staff of the Ridgewood blog

Newark NJ, U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), Enforcement and Removal Operations (ERO) Newark Field Office arrested 113 criminal targets during an operation Jun. 5-9, as part of the agency’s ongoing public safety and national security efforts. The operation was supported by the U.S. Customs and Border Protection’s New Jersey Field Office, the New Jersey State Parole Office, and ICE Homeland Security Investigations.

All of the targets in this operation were criminal in nature. 93% of those that were arrested were convicted criminals and 87% of them had prior felony convictions.

“The continued results of our Fugitive Operations officers and their law enforcement partners underscore ICE’s ongoing and steady commitment to public safety,” said John Tsoukaris, field office director of ERO Newark. “As part of this operation, we continue focus on the arrest of individuals who are criminal and are a threat to public safety and national security. Because of the tireless efforts of these professional officers, there are 113 fewer criminals in our communities,” he added.

“U.S. Customs and Border Protection is extremely proud to have assisted in this operation,” said Leon Hayward, Acting Director New York Field Office. “It is through collaborative efforts, such as the one leading to today’s arrests, that law enforcement agencies can combat illegal acts and apprehend criminals who pose a threat to the Homeland.”

“The State Parole Board is pleased to have been able to take part in this very successful fugitive operation. Cooperative efforts with other state and federal agencies serve as a force multiplier resulting in a significant public safety benefit. We are proud of the efforts of our parole officers and all that took part in the operation.” said James T. Plousis, chairman of the NJ State Parole Board.

The individuals arrested throughout New Jersey were nationals of Bangladesh, Central African Republic, Chile, Colombia, Costa Rica, Cuba, Dominican Republic, Ecuador, El Salvador, Ghana, Guatemala, Guyana, Haiti, Honduras, India, Iraq, Ireland, Jamaica, Jordan, Korea, Latvia, Liberia, Mexico, Morocco, Nicaragua, Nigeria, Pakistan, Philippines, Peru, Poland, Slovakia, Trinidad and Uruguay.

These individuals range from age 18 to 74 years old and all were previously convicted of a variety of offenses. Some of the convictions included sexual assault on a minor, child abuse, possession of narcotics, distribution of narcotics, robbery, trespassing, damage to property, DUI, crimes against person, fraud, sex offense against a child/fondling, threaten to kill, sexual exploitation of a minor, domestic violence, battery, theft of us government property, possession of a weapon, illegal use of credit cards, burglary, larceny, aggravated assault and illegal reentry.

Among those arrested during this operation include:

A Iraqi citizen convicted of possession of narcotics
A Honduran citizen wanted by Honduras for the offense of double Homicide
A Latvian citizen convicted of heroin sale
A El Salvador citizen convicted of sexual exploitation of a minor
A Ecuadorian citizen convicted of sexual exploitation of a minor
A Jordanian citizen convicted of synthetic narcotic possession
A Dominican citizen convicted of cocaine sale
A Bangladesh citizen convicted of aggravated assault with a weapon

In fiscal year 2016, ICE conducted 240,255 removals nationwide. Over ninety percent of individuals removed from the interior of the United States had previously been convicted of a criminal offense.

ICE is focused on smart, effective immigration enforcement that targets serious criminal aliens who present the greatest risk to the security of our communities, such as those charged with or convicted of homicide, rape, robbery, kidnapping, major drug offenses and threats to national security.

ERO Newark works closely with federal, state, and local law enforcement partners to enforce federal immigration laws as part of its homeland security mission.

Posted on December 2, 2015 December 2, 2015

Iraqis think the U.S. is in cahoots with the Islamic State, and it is hurting the war

By Liz Sly December 1 at 9:24 PM

BAIJI, Iraq — On the front lines of the battle against the Islamic State, suspicion of the United States runs deep. Iraqi fighters say they have all seen the videos purportedly showing U.S. helicopters airdropping weapons to the militants, and many claim they have friends and relatives who have witnessed similar instances of collusion.

Ordinary people also have seen the videos, heard the stories and reached the same conclusion — one that might seem absurd to Americans but is widely believed among Iraqis — that the United States is supporting the Islamic State for a variety of pernicious reasons that have to do with asserting American control over Iraq, the wider Middle East and, perhaps, its oil.

“It is not in doubt,” said Mustafa Saadi, who says his friend saw U.S. helicopters delivering bottled water to Islamic State positions. He is a commander in one of the Shiite militias that last month helped push the militants out of the oil refinery near Baiji in northern Iraq alongside the Iraqi army.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/middle_east/iraqis-think-the-us-is-in-cahoots-with-isis-and-it-is-hurting-the-war/2015/12/01/d00968ec-9243-11e5-befa-99ceebcbb272_story.html

Posted on February 15, 2015 June 27, 2021

Correction: Three American Journalists Dead Within a 24 Hour Period

Ned Colt w/NBC (Top Left) – Bob Simon w/CBS (Bottom Left) – David Carr w/NY Times (Bottom Right) – Bob Hager w/NBC (Top Right). Photo courtesy of: J. Schuyler Montague

Four American Journalists Dead Within a 24 Hour Period
February 14,2015
staff of the Ridgewood blog

Ok is it just us but four American journalists dead Inside the US within the past 24 hours? First Ned Colt of NBC dropped dead of a stroke yesterday.(. he was “supposedly” kidnapped during the Iraq war for several days, then freed?)
Bob Simon of CBS died in a car crash yesterday.. (he also was “supposedly” kidnapped held captive for 40 days in an Iraq jail. David Carr of NY Times just died suddenly interestingly enough after interviewing Edward Snowden, and had just come out against Brian Williams from NBC while on CBS ,calling Williams out for lying about being shot down in the Iraq war and then there was Bob Hager the NBC aviation expert now has a head on crash. This us not to mention the Brian Williams debacle and who is now off the air for lying about the Iraq war.

Correction :Bob Hager is fine (https://www.adweek.com/tvnewser/former-nbc-newser-bob-hager-unhurt-after-head-on-crash/255845 ) Longtime NBC News correspondent Bob Hager was involved in a head-on collision near his home in Vermont Thursday. Hager was uninjured; his wife, Honore, was hospitalized with back and neck injuries. Our sincerest apologizes .

Posted on August 20, 2014 August 20, 2014

US Journalist beheaded by ISIS

US Journalist beheaded by ISIS

Executioner ‘with a British accent’ beheads US journalist in the name of ISIS: Mother of slaughtered American calls on Islamist group to cease killing and pays tribute to her ‘extraordinary son’

Photojournalist James Wright Foley has been beheaded by ISIS forces
He went missing in Syria in 2012 while working for GlobalPost news agency
ISIS posted extremely graphic video ‘A Message to America’ to social media
Foley speaks to camera before his death and labels the U.S. his killers
Apparently coerced by his captors into speaking against his country
Masked and robed executioner speaks English in apparent London accent
Video also shows man identified as missing journalist Steven Joel Sotloff
Militant warns he will be killed next if U.S airstrikes in Iraq do not cease
British Foreign Secretary today said ‘appalling’ video appeared to be genuine

By JOHN HALL FOR MAILONLINE and JAMES NYE and ASHLEY COLLMAN

PUBLISHED: 16:15 EST, 19 August 2014 | UPDATED: 05:19 EST, 20 August 2014

A shocking video has emerged showing an ISIS militant who speaks with a British accent brutally executing an American photojournalist who was kidnapped in Syria two years ago.

Graphic footage of the execution appeared in an video titled: ‘A Message to the U.S.’, in which an apparently coerced James Wright Foley, 40, describes America as his true killers for using airstrikes to assist Kurdish forces in recapturing the Mosul Dam from ISIS militants.

Foley – who went missing in 2012 while working for the Global Post news agency in Syria – is then beheaded with a small knife over a period of seven minutes by a masked man dressed all in black.

The executioner, who speaks directly to the camera in what appears to be a London accent, then warns that a second captured American journalist will be killed if the U.S. doesn’t halt the airstrikes.

Speaking after the video emerged, Foley’s mother Diane issued a statement saying that she and her husband John have ‘never been prouder’ of their son, who they say gave his life to expose the suffering of the Syrian people.

Read more: https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2729287/ISIS-beheads-journalist-James-Wright-Foley-warning-US.html#ixzz3AvWlhDvV

Posted on July 27, 2014 July 27, 2014

War on Women : ISIS orders female genital mutilation in Iraq

U.N.: ISIS orders female genital mutilation in Iraq

Staff Writer, Al Arabiya News
Thursday, 24 July 2014

The al-Qaeda-Inspired Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS) has ordered all girls and women between the ages of 11 and 46 in and around Iraq’s northern city of Mosul to undergo female genital mutilation, the United Nations said on Thursday.

“It is a fatwa (or religious edict) of ISIS, we learnt this this morning,” said Jacqueline Badcock, the number two U.N. official in Iraq.

Read the latest on this story: Iraq NGO: ISIS likely to implement FGM fatwa

The “fatwa” would potentially affect 4 million women and girls, Badcock told reporters in Geneva by videolink from Arbil.

“This is something very new for Iraq, particularly in this area, and is of grave concern and does need to be addressed,” she said, according to Reuters.

https://english.alarabiya.net/en/News/middle-east/2014/07/24/-ISIS-order-female-genital-mutilation-in-Iraq.html

Posted on June 14, 2014 June 14, 2014

“What Difference does it Make ” Iraq casts shadow over Clinton

“What Difference does it Make ” Iraq casts shadow over Clinton
By Alexander Bolton – 06/14/14 06:00 AM EDT

The growing crisis and threat of all-out civil war in Iraq has cast a cloud over Hillary Clinton’s book tour touting her accomplishments as secretary of State.

The release of “Hard Choices” was supposed to remind people of the foreign policy credentials she burnished in the Obama administration.

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On Tuesday, White House spokesman Josh Earnest even said Clinton’s greatest accomplishments at the State Department included ending the war in Iraq and “decimating and destroying” al Qaeda.

But those résumé bullet points are now up for debate as Iraq has erupted in violence and insurgents linked to al Qaeda have captured four cities, including Mosul, Iraq’s second-largest metropolitan center.

“It’s going to be a problem for her starting now,” Republican National Committee spokesman Sean Spicer said of the country’s collapsing stability.

“You have the White House three days ago talking about one of her greatest accomplishment was eradicating al Qaeda in Iraq. One of her greatest accomplishments was winding down war in Iraq. Forty-eight hours later we’re dealing with a situation where we’re talking about how to best help eradicate an al Qaeda offshoot in Iraq,” he said.

Read more: https://thehill.com/policy/international/209386-iraq-casts-shadow-on-clintons-book-tour#ixzz34dqt5tom

Posted on June 14, 2014 June 14, 2014

Obama’s national security team under fire

Obama’s national security team under fire

By Alexander Bolton – 06/13/14 06:00 AM EDT

President Obama’s team of national security advisers is under attack on Capitol Hill for not foreseeing the collapse of Iraq’s army forces who have been routed by Sunni jihadists.

Republicans are calling for heads to roll, and Democrats have been slow to defend Obama’s national security team after a string of questionable performances.

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Lawmakers on both sides of the aisle have second-guessed Obama’s decision to release five senior Taliban commanders from Guantánamo Bay and his handling of the civil war in Syria. Now they’re concerned the insurgent’s lightning war across Iraq has taken the administration by surprise.

Obama even took heat Thursday from the editorial page of The Washington Post, which asserted the “pretense” of Obama’s claim to have ended the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan “is becoming increasingly difficult to sustain.”

Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) called for the wholesale resignation of Obama’s national security team, starting with Gen. Martin Dempsey, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff.

“We need a new national security adviser. We need a new team. We need a new team that knows what America’s national security interests are and are more interested in national security than they are in politics,” he said on the Senate floor.

Read more: https://thehill.com/policy/international/209262-obamas-national-security-team-under-fire#ixzz34dxVDCI4

Posted on June 13, 2014 January 20, 2019

Disheartened N.J. veterans, families wonder if the sacrifice in Iraq, Afghanistan was worth it

Disheartened N.J. veterans, families wonder if the sacrifice in Iraq, Afghanistan was worth it

JUNE 12, 2014, 6:30 PM LAST UPDATED: THURSDAY, JUNE 12, 2014, 11:45 PM
BY MATTHEW MCGRATH, JIM NORMAN AND ABBOTT KOLOFF
STAFF WRITERS
THE RECORD

Discouragement. Sadness. Renewed heartache for lives lost. Resignation: that feeling of having known from the start how it would end.

And all of it profoundly felt.

The full-blown Islamist offensive in Iraq is sparking those feelings, and more, in North Jersey veterans and families who sacrificed time and blood to a sense of patriotic duty in the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. They are keeping close watch on the situation — and are wholly disappointed with the failure of American-trained and -equipped government forces.

Related: Obama: US will send fresh help to beleaguered Iraq

“This is a prime example of what failing to complete a mission looks like, and this is what Afghanistan will look like in the future,” said Matt Bombace, a former Marine infantry sergeant who fought in Iraq in 2005 and at 27 is the youngest man to serve as commander of the Washington Elm VFW Post 192 in Ridgewood.

But more to the emotional point for many was the reaction of John Walter Wroblewski of Jefferson, who has visited the spot in Iraq where his Marine son, John Thomas, was fatally shot in 2004.

“Did our sons die in vain?” Wroblewski, the longtime athletic director at Palisades Park High School, wondered. “I am extremely proud of my son. I am proud of what he did. All the blood that was spilled just in taking Ramadi, and here we are giving it back. It’s just disheartening.”

Related: Iraq Sunni militant group vows to march on Baghdad

Dozens of North Jersey men died between the invasion of Iraq in March 2003 and the U.S. departure in 2011. Thousands of New Jerseyans in active duty, reserve and National Guard units fought there, in Afghanistan or both. The largest combat deployment of the state’s National Guard since World War II — 2,900 from the “Jersey Blues” 50th Infantry Brigade Combat team — was in Iraq in 2008.

– See more at: https://www.northjersey.com/news/disheartened-n-j-veterans-families-wonder-if-the-sacrifice-in-iraq-afghani