"Early this
morning Russia launched a ballistic missile attack against the capital [Kyiv],
killing a civilian and resulting in debris and fires around the city."
"[The United States and its partners were] surging security assistance and energy support [to the country] in response to these brutal attacks."
U.S. Ambassador Bridget A. Brink
"[Several embassies housed in the same building were damaged in the 'barbaric' attack]."
"These are the embassies of Albania, Argentina, Palestine, North
Macedonia, Portugal and Montenegro."
"In response to the actions of the Kyiv regime, supported by Western
curators, this morning a group strike with long-range precision weapons
was launched against the SBU command post, the Kyiv Luch design bureau,
which designs and manufactures Neptune missile systems, Olkha
ground-based cruise missiles, and the positions of the Patriot
anti-aircraft missile system."
"The strike targets were achieved. All objects were hit."
Russia’s Ministry of Defense
"More sanctions against Russia are needed."
"I would also like to thank all of our partners who are
responding to this and other Russian attacks by being ready to provide
more air defense systems."
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy
A
rescue worker walks by as firefighters work to extinguish a fire near
the site of a building destroyed during a Russian missile strike, amid
Russia's attack on Ukraine, in central Kyiv, Ukraine, Dec. 20, 2024. Thomas Peter/Reuters
Moscow claims its ballistic missile attack on Kyiv early Friday was a response to a Ukrainian strike on Russian soil with the use of American-made weapons. Shortly before sunrise three loud blasts were heard in Ukraine's capital city. According to the Ukraine air force, five Iskander short-range ballistic missiles fired at the city were intercepted. Heating to 630 residential buildings, 16 medical facilities, 30 schools and kindergartens and the city administration had their heating knocked out by the attack.
Falling missile debris was the cause of additional damage, while sparking fires in three districts. "We ask citizens to immediately respond to reports of ballistic attack threats, because there is very little time to find shelter", the air force stated. Russia regularly bombards civilian areas of Ukraine with the clear intention of unnerving Ukrainians while trying to destroy the power grid in Ukraine.
Ukraine, on the other hand, in its struggle to restrain Russia's larger military on the front line, has made an effort to strike Russian infrastructure that supports Moscow's war against Ukraine. Falling debris smashed into the city centre in Kyiv, damaging several dozen highrise office towers, as well as the city landmark of the Catholic Church of St. Nicholas along with the Kyiv National Linguistic University. So much for Russia claiming to aim for Ukrainian military installations.
Ukrainian officials said Moscow had launched a fresh attack on Kyiv. Reuters
Blast waves from an intercepted low-flying missile blew out windows at six embassies, according to the Ukrainian Foreign Ministry, among other damage caused. Air raid sirens rang out again about five hours on. Those sheltering at home in the early morning attack, felt the walls of their apartments shaking in the blasts, while outside fire engines and ambulances raced through city streets. One resident explained: "With the naked eye you could see that many buildings ... were damaged, with glass shards on the ground, far from the explosion epicentre", said Valeriia Dubova while sheltering in a packed subway station.
The strike, according to the Russian Defence Ministry, was a response to Russia's Rostov border region being attacked by Ukraine making use of six American-made Army Tactical Missile System (ATACMS) missiles, and four Storm Shadow air-launched missiles courtesy of the United Kingdom. In that attack of two days earlier, Ukraine's aim was to target a Rostov oil refinery, part of its campaign to strike Russian infrastructure supplying Moscow's war plans.
A
view shows buildings damaged during a Russian missile strike, amid
Russia's attack on Ukraine, in Kyiv, Ukraine, Dec. 20, 2024. State Emergency Service Of Ukraine via Reuters
"There's
a fear that this kind of restriction will enlarge into a wider
community, considering the geopolitical tensions nowadays around the
world, so the fear is definitely there."
"If
the U.S. is really a champion of academic freedom, what you should do
is not restrict this kind of communications between different countries
of the world."
Jacky Li, 3rd-yr environmental studies major, University of California, Berkley
"We aren't bringing in anyone from Gaza, Syria, Somalia, Yemen or Libya or anywhere else that threatens our security."
"[We
will] revoke the student visas of radical anti-American and antisemitic
foreigners at our colleges and universities [in response to campus
protests]."
President-elect Donald Trump ... October 2023 election campaign
Cornell University has issued a travel advisory to international students. LightRocket via Getty Images
Uncertainty
over the status of foreign students studying at U.S. universities and
colleges with the accession of Donald J. Trump back to the White House
appears to have caused a frisson of excited responses, where a growing
list of American academic institutes are now advising their
international students to make haste in returning to campus before the
president-elect is inaugurated, to ensure that they can, after all,
return to their studies in the United States.
In
anticipation of travel bans being once again instituted, over a dozen
schools have now issued travel advisories. For anyone facing uncertainty
over whether they may be able to remain in the United States who
depends on an academic visas, the advice is to return to campus from
abroad before January 20.
In
January 2017 then-President Trump had issued an executive order banning
travel to the U.S. by citizens of seven predominantly Muslim countries:
Iraq, Syria, Iran, Sudan Libya, Somalia and Yemen; just incidentally
countries where the U.S. was or had been at war with, and whose
nationals often turn out to be problematic in observing American laws,
their faith in Islam leading them to socially incongruent methods of
'expression'.
Either
barred from flight or detained at U.S. airports after landing,
travellers who included both students and faculty, tourists,
businessmen, and visitors, faced unpleasant interdiction. Some of those
countries were removed in time while others were added; some 15 in total
and over 40,000 individuals had been refused visas resulting from the
ban. A ban rescinded when President Biden took office in 2021.
US.
colleges and universities enrolled over 1.1 million international
students during the 2023-24 school year; students from India and China
accounting for over half of all international students in the U.S. While
roughly 43,800 had arrived from the 15 countries that had been affected
by Mr. Trump's original travel restrictions. The question hovers as to
what the Trump transition team knows is to come, although Mr. Trump
himself has iterated his intention to revive the travel ban and expand
it with new "ideological screening" for non-U.S. citizens.
He made it clear that his intention is to bar "dangerous lunatics, haters, bigots and maniacs".
The list of institutions advising international students to return
before inauguration day and to prepare for potential delays at
immigration control, includes Harvard and Brown, Boston schools like
Northeastern University and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology,
and others around the country, from Johns Hopkins University to the
University of Southern California.
Cornell University informed its students that a travel ban involving the 13 countries President Trump previously targeted "is likely to go into effect soon after inauguration", and it is likely that other nations could be placed on the list; in particular China and India.
The Vile Wave of violence, Hatred and Intimidation of Jews in Canada
"[The] fire-bombing of the synagogue is not a one-off event."
"[It is] part of a pattern of an exponential rise in hate crimes and incendiary hate speech incentivized by a culture of impunity as in the absence of accountability of the crime of willful promotion of hatred."
"What is so necessary now is strategic policy direction at the governmental and municipal level around the four Ps:
Prevention of the crime to begin with;
Protection of the target;
Prosecution of the perpetrators; and
Partnerships among federal, provincial and municipal authorities.
Irwin Cotler, human rights lawyer, founder, Raoul Wallenberg Centre for Human Rights
"There is no question that Canada has become a more dangerous place for the Jewish people under the divisiveness of Justin Trudeau that has stoked it."
"Another day brings another brazen act of antisemitic hate, and it's well overdue that the government do something or anything to protect Canadians."
"These lawless mobs of lowlifes must be brought to justice."
Conservative Party deputy leader Melissa Lantsman
"These hate activities are overwhelmingly directed against the Jewish community, students and faculty, and ordinary citizens on our streets."
"They are also being directed against people living in quiet residential neighbourhoods in Westmount and merchants around them."
"As a result, most within the Jewish community and many other residents of the Montreal Island are feeling unsafe."
"We are asking you, as the Mayor and chief of staff to ensure, through policy direction, that there is zero tolerance for antisemitic crime activity in our city, and that as a matter of policy and strategic guidance, the police robustly use the criminal law tools and municipal bylaws available to them to protect the public."
Cote Saint-Luc Mayor Mitchell Brownstein, Westmount Mayor Christina Smith, Liberal MP Anthony Housefather
A
damaged window is seen at Congregation Beth Tikvah in Montreal after
its second arson attack in a little more than a year, Wednesday December
18, 2024.Photo by John Mahoney/Postmedia
For the second time since the October 7, 2023 massacre in southern Israel by Palestinian Hamas terrorists, a Montreal synagogue was firebombed. A fire had been reported at Congregation Beth Tikvah at 3:00 a.m. Wednesday morning. When police arrived they found remnants of a firebomb that had been thrown through a window of the building. In Toronto, several days later, a Jewish parochial school was shot at again, at the front doors. These events occur early in the pre-dawn hours, wreaking double damage; to the buildings themselves and to the security of mind and person of the targeted community.
On news of the fire-bombing, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau let loose with his usual verbal reaction, that Service de Police de la ville de Montreal is investigating the "hateful act. This vile antisemitic attack against Montreal's Jewish community is cowardly and criminal", he responded. He speaks the language of responsible government, but has never yet -- in a year-and-a-half of street mobs shouting threats at Jewish Canadians, of stalking them in their communities to hurl invective at them, of calling for the destruction of Israel -- undertaken any direct action to put a stop to the unlawful events.
Anthony Housefather, Mount Royal Liberal MP, called on authorities to "make every effort to quick[ly] arrest anyone responsible" for the firebombing. He, along with others in municipal authorities co-wrote and addressed an open letter to Montreal Mayor Valerie Plante for stricter law enforcement to provide due protection to the city's Jewish community. She, like other municipal authorities, like their provincial counterparts, like the federal government itself, have verbally deplored these unlawful, hateful events, but have done nothing within the law to put a stop to them, nor instructed police to follow the law.
The errant, unforgivable failure to pursue hate speech criminal law, along with an "over-reliance on non-enforcement as a form of de-escalation", pointed out the letter co-signers "has emboldened protesters and demonstrators to engage in intimidating, violent acts and unequivocal hate speech, and thus, ultimately, has not successfully addressed the unsafe and toxic situation in our city". Toronto's mayor too, has done nothing to address the lack of safety and security for the public in that city; a permissive aura for tolerating intolerable Jew-hating marches and volatile speeches have marked her as a failure.
"Over the last 14 months, this is the seventh instance where a Jewish institution has been targeted in Montreal and the second time these specific institutions were targeted, chilling reminders of what happens when politicians fail to call out antisemitism and prevent the escalation of violence on our streets", wrote the Centre for Israel and Jewish Affairs, along with Federation CJA, a Montreal-based Jewish organization.
After local Montreal police responded to the synagogue call, to find a flammable projectile had broken a window and ignited within the building, scorching nearby walls before first responders arrived, law enforcement later that morning discovered two windows destroyed at a nearby Federation CJA Jewish community building.
Both properties had been attacked in similar manner with a Molotov cocktail thrown at the synagogue and a fire started at the back exit of the Federal CJA building in November of 2023, a month following the Hamas invasion of southern Israel on October 7.
"The attack on the synagogue is] appalling, yet another example of the vile wave of violence, hatred and intimidation to which Jews in Canada -- and all over the world -- have been subjected in recent weeks and months."
"The world must wake up, words are not enough: synagogues burned, Jews attacked -- NEVER AGAIN IS NOW."
"Following this terrible attack especially, I call on the Canadian government to act decisively, and show that such hatred will not be tolerated."
"Israel
now has a clear route to Iran and will likely continue to have one for
the foreseeable future [rebuilding or replacing destroyed equipment
could take years]."
"Iran was exposed already, and the October strikes proved that."
Gregory Brew, Iran analyst, Eurasia Group
"Hezbollah
has lost the supply route coming through Syria at the current stage,
but this is a small detail and may change with time."
"[Hezbollah is exploring other ways to rearm, possibly seeking an agreement under Syria's] new regime."
Naim Qassem, new Hezbollah leader
"[The public debate in Iran reflected] a perception that Iran needs to rectify a strategic imbalance with its adversaries."
"The fingers of the Islamic Republic are being cut off and are getting weaker."
"The fall of Bashar al-Assad didn't only raise the hopes of the opposition but also raised the spirits of the Iranian nation."
Iranian opposition activist, eastern Iran
Israeli patrol vehicles cross the security
fence in the Golan Heights near Majdal Shams, Dec. 12, 2024. Israel
says its move into the military buffer zone is defensive and temporary. Matias Delacroix/AP
The
government of the Islamic Republic has become all too desperate about
its rising vulnerability, alarm generated that stirs concerns its
escalating conflict with Israel may enter a more dangerous phase
shortly, with hard-line regime supporters speaking publicly and more
frequently of adopting nuclear deterrence to thwart a potential Israeli
attack. Among Iran's opposition, however, new hope has arisen that the
descent of Iranian power may lead to a reduction at home of
authoritarian rule.
Since
the surprise lightning events of Syria's mass murdering Alawite
regime's deposing by Islamist rebel groups taking advantage of a power
vacuum courtesy of Israel's conflict with Hezbollah that has destroyed
80 percent of the Iranian proxy terror group's arms, and by extension
weakening the Islamic Republic itself, seeing the abrupt departure of
Iranian advisers from Syria and withdrawal of allied regional forces,
Israel was given another opportunity to destroy huge stockpiles of
Syrian military infrastructure.
A drone view shows sunken boats at the
Mediterranean port of Latakia in northwest Syria, Dec. 11, 2024, after
Israel said it struck and destroyed Syrian military equipment and
facilities once rebels seized power. Salaah Jeaar/Reuters
Warplanes,
helicopters, weapons caches and the major portion of Syria's navy were
destroyed by hundreds of Israeli airstrikes which Israel claims were
launched to prevent the military equipment from being claimed by bands
of terrorists. Analysts, however feel the attacks were aimed at further
weakening Iran, serving a critical double purpose. Tehran had installed
military officials in Syria under Assad to prop up his regime and
protect land routes used to advance weapons to Hezbollah in Lebanon.
"Iran is always part of the picture. It was like a root canal",
observed Yoram Schweitzer, former Israeli intelligence officer,
referring to the bombing campaign. Schweitzer observed that Syria's
former radar systems could provide Iran with early warning of Israeli
attacks; its advanced Russian air defences were a "constraining factor" for Maneuverability by Israel in the area, Iran analyst Gregory Brew of the Eurasia Group added.
Israel
had been engaged in a year's-long covert operation against Iranian
assets in Syria, with over 100 airstrikes on Syrian territory since
October 2023, carried out without public acknowledgement. At least 24
IRGC officers had been killed over the past 14 months in Syria, in
strikes aimed at "gutting the middle of IRGC leadership, designed to get the structure to collapse in on itself", according to Behnam Ben Taleblu, director of the Iran program at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies in Washington.
In
October, Iran launched its second direct attack on Israel following
devastating hits on its Hezbollah ally. The Israeli strike that killed
Hezbollah leader Hasan Nasrallah was devastating both for Hezbollah and
for the Islamic Republic. Three weeks into a ceasefire agreement with
Israel, Hezbollah acknowledged that it had seen itself cut off from
Iran. As a result of its losses Iranian authorities are now more openly
discussing the possibility of developing nuclear weapons as a deterrent
against attacks.
Iran
increased its stockpile of highly enriched uranium since last year,
according to the International Atomic Energy Agency. Researchers
concluded that Iran would need one month to further refine that
stockpile to weapons-grade fuel, in a report prepared by the Institute
for Science and International Security. Ahmad Naderi, a hard-line member
of Iran's parliament called for Iran to test "an atomic bomb".
The
Biden White House had warned Israel against bombing nuclear or oil
facilities in its October attack; even so Israeli Prime Minister
Benjamin Netanyahu is focused on capitalizing on gains against Hamas and
Hezbollah, including facing off against Tehran more aggressively once
the new American administration is in place. Mr. Netanyahu, addressing
Iran and Hezbollah warned that Israel "will continue to act against you whenever necessary, in any arena and at any time". When asked in an interview of the prospect of war with Iran, incoming President Trump replied "anything can happen".
Israeli
military vehicles patrol the security fence near the Alpha Line
separating Israeli-controlled Golan Heights from Syria near the town of
Majdal Shams, December 12, 2024. Matias Delacroix, AP
This represents a general opinion site for its author. It also offers a space for the author to record her experiences and perceptions,both personal and public. This is rendered obvious by the content contained in the blog, but the space is here inviting me to write. And so I do.
