Why the US Cannot Be Saved

The people that work here, own you.

I receive many emails from well-intentioned and intelligent readers who hold up Iceland as a shining example of what America must do in order to save herself. I agree, in principle with the people who wrote to me that we should emulate Iceland. The Icelanders have demonstrated tremendous resilience, courage and vision to overcome and, at least temporarily, defeat the banksters while restoring their economy.

The people of Iceland have more courage in their little finger than America has in its entire being. Iceland’s financial failure forced its government to resign or be removed, and it also caused citizens to re-evaluate the merits of their reckless spending, borrowing and consumption. Just how did Iceland do it?

Iceland’s President Olafur Ragnar Grimmson was interviewed earlier this year at the World Economic Forum in Davos on why Iceland has enjoyed such a strong recovery after it’s complete financial collapse in 2008, while the rest of the West is still mired in debt, poverty and hopelessness to go with empty promises of an economic recovery.

When asked whether Iceland’s policy of letting the banks fail would have worked in the rest of Europe, Grimsson stated:

“… Why are the banks considered to be the holy churches of the modern economy? Why are private banks not like airlines and telecommunication companies and allowed to go bankrupt if they have been run in an irresponsible way? The theory that you have to bail-out banks is a theory that you allow bankers enjoy for their own profit their success, and then let ordinary people bear their failure through taxes and austerity. 
People in enlightened democracies are not going to accept that in the long run. …“

Imagine that, let the banks fail! Let the criminal bankers take the same risk as any other business venture. Can we imagine Obama ever speaking this way in public? In fact, if the United States was Iceland, President Obama, John McCain, Diane Feinstein, Nancy Pelosi, Harry Reid, Lindsay Graham, Hillary Clinton, Valerie Jarrett, G.W. Bush, G. H. W. Bush, Lloyd Blankfein, Tim Geithner, Hank Paulson, Jon Corzine, Peter Sutherland, Ben Bernanke, et al., would all be in prison.

And nearly six years later, where is Iceland at today? In just the first year following the repudiation of the debt, the Icelanders economy grew by 2.6%. Banks failed, bankers and politicians were jailed and these brave people wrestled control of their lives back.

If the Icelanders could get their hands on Goldman Sachs officials they would. They impeached and convicted corrupt politicians who were in league with Wall Street, many of whom are serving prison sentences. Iceland is on its way to a full economic recovery while still saying no to the corrupt Goldman Sachs influences in Europe. Iceland is saying no to the Bank of International Settlement. Iceland is a beacon of hope for the rest of the G20 nations including the United States. Yet, the courage on display by the Icelanders will never be on display in the United States.

Americans Aren’t Icelanders

There are a number reasons that America will never throw off the shackles of the Bastards from Basel. First and foremost, we, as a country, are just too plain stupid. Through repeated and failed education programs, such as Goals 2000, No Child Left Behind and now the substandard Common Core, Americans lack the basic sense to organize against anything, much less a virulent pack of banksters.

Additionally, at the end of the day, the Icelanders victory will prove to be inconsequential and very temporary. When the international forces align against Iceland for some contrived excuse, their government will collapse like a house of cards and the banksters will be back in control. We have seen it in Egypt, Libya and soon it will be Iceland’s turn.

The Duck Dynasty worshiping, American Idol watching country can’t even find England on a map 65% of the time. A whopping 80% cannot find Iraq on a map, 55% cannot name the Vice President and America reads nearly two whole grade levels lower than they did only a 40 years ago. In short, the rank and file of our citizenry lacks the intelligence to organize their collective shoes in the closet.

Change can be painful and America has become a soft nation. We are not only an ignorant nation, we are the most obese nation on the planet. Most of the people in this country could not fight their way out of a wet paper bag. My military sources tell me that there have been serious discussions among the military leadership about how they would fight a guerrilla war against the bankster occupation forces which will consist mostly of the Chinese and the Russians. What is holding them back is that they do not feel that they can count on the support from the rank and file of this population. The military believes that maybe, on a good day, 2-3% of the adult males would stand with dissident military forces. I never thought I would write this, but the American people are no tougher than the French and the French haven’t won a war in over 200 years.

I do expect that the factions of the military are going to rise and put up some resistance. However, no revolution can be successful without the support of the people.

Conclusion

Well-intentioned people write to me and tell me how 250 million gun owners are going to throw off the chains of slavery. If that were going to happen, it would have happened nearly six years ago. In 2008, the banksters, led by Hank Paulson, helped themselves to our nation’s money and our economy went into free fall. And what did we do to stop the greatest bank robbery in world history? We did nothing!!! Subsequently, we are a defeated nation. With the growing foreign troop presence and the rise of America’s version of the East German Stasi (aka the DHS), we are also an occupied nation. Americans have lost the war and most are unaware that anything has even happened. Hillary Clinton is selling off the assets of this country to the Chinese. The EPA is stealing a million acres of land at a time. Your retirements, IRA’s and bank account will soon be gone. And what will most of America do, change the channel and open another beer.

This is why my analyses and subsequently my writing style changed to more of an adaptation approach. Americans need to be worried about having enough resources to survive the induced social chaos that is coming. Our people must also be able to defend their resources. And finally, you and your family need to develop strategies on how to avoid being induced or forced to into a detention camp. These events are not far away.If you do not know how to pray, now is the time to learn.

Credit to The Common Sense

Is a Major Gold Scandal Going Mainstream?

We noted in 2012 that there are serious questions as to whether the Fed and other central banks really have the gold holdings which they claim.

Image: Gold Bullion (Wikimedia Commons).

This story is starting to go mainstream.

The Financial Times writes today (h/t Zero Hedge):

A year ago the Bundesbank announced that it intended to repatriate 700 tons of Germany’s gold from Paris and New York. Although a couple of jumbo jets could have managed the transatlantic removal, it made security sense to ship the load in smaller consignments. Just how small, and over how long, has only just become apparent.

Last month Jens Weidmann, Bundesbank president, admitted that just 37 tons had arrived in Frankfurt. The original timescale, to complete the transfer by 2020, was leisurely enough, but at this rate it would take 20 years for a simple operation. Well, perhaps not so simple. While he awaits delivery, Herr Weidmann is welcome to come and look through the bars in the Federal Reserve’s vaults, but the question is: whose bars are they?

In the “armchair farmer” fraud you are told: “Look, this is your pig, in the sty.” It works until everyone wants physical delivery of their pig, which is why Buba’s move last year caused such a stir. After all nobody knows whether there are really 260m ounces of gold in Fort Knox, because the US government won’t let auditors inside.

The delivery problem for the Fed is a different breed of pig. The gold market is far more than exchanging paper money for precious metal. Indeed the metal seems something of a sideshow. In June last year the average volume of gold cleared in London hit 29m ounces per day. The world’s mines are producing 90m ounces per year. The traded volume was many times the cleared volume.

The paper gold in the London Bullion Market takes the familiar forms that bankers have turned into profit machines: futures, options, leveraged trades, collateralised obligations, ETFs . . . a storm of exotic instruments, each of which is carefully logged, cross-checked and audited.

Or perhaps not. High-flying traders find such backroom work tedious, and prefer to let some drone do it, just as they did with those money-market instruments that fuelled the banking crisis. The drones will have full control of the paper trail, won’t they? There’s surely no chance that the Fed’s little delivery difficulty has anything to do with the cat’s-cradle of pledges based on the gold in its vaults?

John Hathaway suspects there is. He worries about all the paper (and pixels) linked to gold. He runs the Tocqueville gold fund (the clue is in the name) and doesn’t share the near-universal gloom of London’s gold analysts, who a year ago forecast an average $1700 for 2013. It is currently $1,260.

As has been remarked here before, forecasting the price is for mugs and bugs. But one day the ties that bind this pixelated gold may break, with potentially catastrophic results. So if you fancy gold at today’s depressed price, learn from Buba and demand delivery.

 Credit to Infowars

Bundesbank "Countries about to go bankrupt should draw on the private wealth before asking other states for help".

 

In what is sure to be met with cries of derision across the European Union, in line with what the IMF had previously recommended (and we had previously warned as inevitable), the Bundesbank said on Monday that countries about to go bankrupt should draw on the private wealth of their citizens through a one-off capital levy before asking other states for help. As Reuters reports, the Bundesbank states, "(A capital levy) corresponds to the principle of national responsibility, according to which tax payers are responsible for their government's obligations before solidarity of other states is required." However, they note that they will not support an implementation of a recurrent wealth tax in Germany, saying it would harm growth. We await the refutation (or Draghi's jawbone solution to this line in the sand.)

Via Reuters,

Germany's Bundesbank said on Monday that countries about to go bankrupt should draw on the private wealth of their citizens through a one-off capital levy before asking other states for help.

The Bundesbank's tough stance comes after years of euro zone crisis that saw five government bailouts. There have also bond market interventions by the European Central Bank in, for example, Italy where households' average net wealth is higher than in Germany.

"(A capital levy) corresponds to the principle of national responsibility, according to which tax payers are responsible for their government's obligations before solidarity of other states is required," the Bundesbank said in its monthly report.

It warned that such a levy carried significant risks and its implementation would not be easy, adding it should only be considered in absolute exceptional cases, for example to avert a looming sovereign insolvency.

...

The German Institute for Economic Research calculated in 2012 that in Germany a 10-percent levy on a tax base derived from a personal allowance of 250,000 euros would add up to around 230 billion euros. It did not give a figure for crisis countries due to lack of sufficient data.

Greece has been granted bailout funds of 240 billion euros from the euro area, its national central banks and IMF to protect it from a chaotic default and possible exit from the euro zone. Not all funds have been paid out yet.

In Germany, however, the Bundesbank said it would not support an implementation of a recurrent wealth tax, saying it would harm growth.

...

"It is not the purpose of European monetary policy to ensure solvency of national banking systems or governments and it cannot replace necessary economic adjustments or bank balance sheet clean ups," the Bundesbank said.

As BCG concluded previously:

In considering some of the potential measures likely to be required, the reader may be struck by the essential problem facing politicians: there may be only painful ways out of the crisis.

...

There is one thing we would like to bring to our readers' attention because we are confident, that one way or another, sooner or later, it will be implemented. Namely a one-time wealth tax: in other words, instead of stealth inflation, the government will be forced to proceed with over transfer of wealth. According to BCG, the amount of developed world debt between household, corporate and government that needs to be eliminated is just over $21 trillion. Which unfortunately means that there is an equity shortfall that will have to be funded with incremental cash which will have to come from somewhere. That somewhere is tax of the middle and upper classes, which are in possession of $74 trillion in financial assets, which in turn will have to be taxed at a blended rate of 28.7%.

 

The programs BCG (and the Bundesbank) described would be drastic. They would not be popular, and they would require broad political coordinate and leadership – something that politicians have replaced up til now with playing for time, in spite of a deteriorating outlook. Acknowledgment of the facts may be the biggest hurdle. Politicians and central bankers still do not agree on the full scale of the crisis and are therefore placing too much hope on easy solutions. We need to understand that balance sheet recessions are very different from normal recessions.  The longer the politicians and bankers wait, the more necessary will be the response outlined in this paper.  Unfortunately, reaching consensus on such tough action might requiring an environment last seen in the 1930s

Credit to Zero Hedge

Palestinians see destruction of Jews as realistic possibility

Defense minister lashes out at PA incitement during appearance to mark International Holocaust Remembrance Day.

Israel will no longer tolerate Palestinian incitement and attempts to isolate it in international institutions, Defense Minister Moshe Ya'alon said on Monday.

Speaking at an event to mark International Holocaust Remembrance Day, the defense minister lashed out at the Palestinian Authority for claiming to seek peace on one hand yet encouraging "efforts to boycott Israel."

"This incitement is manifest in the education system and the media, where the hatred and poison ought to be an affront to any human," he said. "It is creating another generation of Palestinian children who are taught to look at the expulsion and destruction of the Jews as a realistic possibility instead of educating them toward a culture of peace and co-existence alongside Israel.""In the Palestinian Authority, whose leadership presents itself as one that is striving to reach an agreement with us, the brutal, insufferable incitement against the State of Israel and the Jewish people continues," Ya'alon said.

Credit to Jerusalem Post

HSBC and Chase Send Clear Signals That a Bank Run Is Near

Can you find yourself in the picture?

The HSBC bank is limiting withdrawals in both the United States and in Britain.

For the life of me, I have no idea why anyone would want to bank in this criminal enterprise bank. Regardless, isn’t the money your money? Shouldn’t you be able to do with your money what you want without justifying the purpose to the bank that you designate to hold your money?

John Cruz is a former vice president and relationship manager at HSBC. Cruz has made two guest appearances on The Common Sense Show in which he alleged that he uncovered that HSBC was laundering money for the Mexican drug cartels through phony shell corporations. He brought this to the attention of his supervisors  at HSBC and was told to “leave it alone”. When he did not leave it alone, he was fired. Cruz went to prosecutors in the New York City area. They acknowledged that they knew what was going at HSBC, but they refused to investigate and prosecute and DHS and the FBI told Cruz the same thing.  

The Cruz revelations leave no doubt that the entire banking system is nothing but a criminal enterprise system.

The Banking System Is Nearing Collapse

HSBC has admitted that it has not informed customers of the change in policy which allows the bank to deny customer withdrawals of cash from their own account. This policy was implemented in November of 2013.

This development at HSBC should raise red flags for everyone, not just HSBC customers, because in the same time frame,JP Morgan Chase announced an identical policy. As a result, many financial analysts are predicting a bank run in the near future and this is the primary strategy of the banks as they are obviously bracing for an economic collapse.

This illegal withholding of bank customer funds is justified by Eric Leenders, the present head of retail at the British Bankers Association. Leenders states that the banks are just being sensible to ask questions as to what the money is for and then make a subsequent decision on whether to release the funds to the account holder. Leenders stated that “I can understand it’s frustrating for customers. But if you are making the occasional large cash withdrawal, the bank wants to make sure it’s the right way to make the payment.” I would agree with Mr. Leenders in that the theft of customer money by a supposed trusted bank is indeed frustrating.

Sending a Clear Message

Clearly, this is a portend of things to come. If the banks were on sound financial footing, account holders would not see any such restrictions. However, if you knew if a bank crash was coming, wouldn’t you make sure your bank was as liquid as possible? To the banks, being liquid and cautious in these perilous times means that the banks intend on making it very difficult for their customers to gain access to their money.

These are the chest pains before the heart attack. Take your money out of the bank while you still can.

An Ominous Development

When the banking collapse happens, it will not be American bankers that will gobble up your life savings, pensions, 401K’s and IRA’s. It will be the Chinese.

Isn’t it interesting that JP Morgan Chase  has sold their property located at One Chase Manhattan Plaza skyscraper to Fosun International, a Chinese investment firm, for $725 million. This is only the latest in a series of New York real estate purchases by Chinese investors.

It is time to connect the dots.

Just the Facts Ma’am

Fact, the American economy is in freefall.

Fact, the Chinese have purchased a large portion of our debt.

Fact, if the Chinese do not position themselves to acquire America’s hard assets before the crash, they will be left holding useless paper.

Fact, your house is a hard asset and the paper note is owned by the bank.

Fact, the Chinese not only make your clothes and most of your personal possessions, the Chinese will be calling in the loans on your homes before the crash, once they acquire more of our banks.

Fact, if a person does not think that your home is not at risk of being taken, then that person does not understand basic finance and they have obviously never heard of the MERS mortgage fraud.


Fact, the government has begun stealing everyone’s 401K and retirement plans from their previous allocations and converting them to buying U.S. government bonds and who owns the lion’s share of the bonds? Chinese take-out anyone?

Fact, many have been reporting that Hillary Clinton has been collateralizing American home mortgages, office buildings, land, public holdings and mineral assets to the Chinese so that they will continue, for a short time, to continue to purchase our debt.

Fact, it would be wise to learn Mandarin Chinese so that you can more effectively communicate with your soon-to-be slave masters.

Welcome to the Old West, Chinese Style

Are you familiar with the term “Company Town”? This is a phrase that was primarily reserved for towns in the “Old West” in places like Bisbee, Arizona. The mining company in Bisbee owned everything. The owned the mine where the people worked. They owned the homes where the people lived. They owned the drug stores. They owned the Grocery stores. In short, they owned it all! I fear that this is the new reality under which we will soon be living in which the Chinese will own everything.

One interesting side note has to do with a historical event called the Bisbee Deportation. The event was precipitated by miners who thought they would protest dangerous working conditions and substandard living quarters. The owners of the company town responded to worker demands by forcing the dissenters into trains and then transported the protesters to the deserts of New Mexico and were forced off of the train in the middle of nowhere. In the near future, I do not think the Chinese will transport dissenters to the desert, the new destination will consist of barb wire facing in and the word FEMA will be imprinted on the sign outside the destination.

Conclusion

What name would you give a system of economics and government where corporate entities own all of the property? I would call it modern day feudalism.

I can best sum up these events in the words of Johnny Cash, “I hear the train acomin’ it’s rollin’ round the bend and I ain’t seen the sunshine since I don’t know when …”

Credit to The Common Sense

Japan reports record annual trade deficit

Japan has reported a record annual trade deficit after the weak yen pushed up the cost of energy imports.

Its deficit rose to 11.5 trillion yen ($112bn; £68bn) in 2013 - a 65% jump from a year ago.

Japan has seen its energy imports rise in recent years after it shut all of its nuclear reactors in the aftermath of the tsunami and earthquake in 2011.

But it is having to pay more for those imports after a series of aggressive policy moves weakened the yen sharply.

The Japanese currency fell more than 20% against the US dollar between January and December last year.

Credit to BBC

Minister calls for third Temple to be built

Minister of Housing and Construction Uri Ariel (left) with the mayor of Ma’aleh Adumim Benny Kasriel during a ceremony in the tract of land known as E1, located between the large West Bank settlement and Jerusalem, in April. (photo credit: Flash90)


A government minister from a nationalist religious party called Thursday for the Jewish Temple to be rebuilt on the Temple Mount in Jerusalem.

The statement from Housing and Construction Minister Uri Ariel (Jewish Home) breaks a long-standing taboo on high-ranking government officials speaking about changing the fragile status quo on the holy and contested esplanade, and will likely draw ire from official Israeli circles and anger the Arab and Muslim world.

Speaking at an archaeological conference next to the West Bank settlement of Shilo and quoted by Maariv, Ariel called for a third Temple to be built on the site, which today is home to the Dome of the Rock and the al-Aqsa Mosque and is considered Judaism’s holiest site and Islam’s third holiest.

“We’ve built many little, little temples,” Ariel said, referring to synagogues, “but we need to build a real Temple on the Temple Mount.”

The Jerusalem site was home to Judaism’s first and second Temples, both of which were destroyed, the second one in 70 CE. The idea of building a third Temple, while popular among some religious and right-wing Jews, is considered outside mainstream Israeli discourse by most.

Last year, Jewish Home MK Zevulun Orlev also called for the rebuilding of the Jewish Temple, saying that removing the Dome of the Rock and al-Aqsa Mosque would mean that the “billion-strong Muslim world would surely launch a world war.” However, he added, “everything political is temporary and there is no stability.”

Jews are currently banned from praying on the Temple Mount by the Jordanian department of endowments, known as the Wakf, which administers the plaza surrounding the al-Aqsa Mosque and the Dome of the Rock.

Credit to The Times of Israel


Read more: Minister calls for third Temple to be built | The Times of Israel http://www.timesofisrael.com/minister-calls-for-third-temple-to-be-built/#ixzz2rbhB1kNZ

Doves released in the Vatican as a gesture of peace are immediately ATTACKED by vicious seagull and crow

Two white doves released by children standing alongside Pope Francis as a peace gesture today were attacked by other birds.

As tens of thousands of people watched in St. Peter's Square, a seagull and a large black crow swept down on the doves right after they were set free from an open window of the Apostolic Palace.

One dove lost some feathers as it broke free from the gull. But the crow pecked repeatedly at the other dove. It was not clear what happened to the doves as they flew off.




Go: Pope Francis is joined by two children who release doves during the Angelus Prayer in St. Peter's Square



Off they fly: Francis was celebrating the prayer from the window of his studio overlooking St. Peter's Square



Windowsill; A seagull attacks a dove released by a child from the papal window during Francis's prayer



Attack: Two white doves had been sent fluttering into the air as a peace gesture by Italian children

While speaking at the window beforehand, Francis had appealed for peace in Ukraine, after at least three people were killed during the latest clashes in the two-month crisis.

Police and demonstrators in Kiev fought again as protests against President Viktor Yanukovich's abrupt turn away from the European Union towards Russia, Ukraine's former Soviet overlord.

‘I am close to Ukraine in prayer, in particular to those who have lost their lives in recent days and to their families,’ Francis said in his weekly Angelus in St Peter's Square.

‘I hope that a constructive dialogue between the institutions and civil society can take place, that any resort to violence is avoided and that the spirit of peace and a search for the common good is in the hearts of all.’



Not getting away: A dove which was freed by children flanked by Pope Francis is attacked by a seagull



Watch out: A dove which was freed by children flanked by Pope Francis is chased by a black crow



Watch out: After the pope and the two children left the windows, a seagull and a big black crow quickly swept down, attacking the doves, including one which had briefly perched on a windowsill



Crow fought the wings of a dove: While speaking at the window beforehand, Francis had appealed for peace in Ukraine, where anti-government protesters have died

The mass rallies against President Yanukovich's rule erupted last November after he pulled out of a free trade deal with the European Union in favour of closer economic ties with Russia.

They have since spiralled into protests against misrule and corruption among Ukraine's leaders and officials.

There have been violent clashes with police in Kiev city centre, resulting in the death of three protesters last week, two from gunshot wounds.

Credit to Daily Mail
Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2546218/Birds-released-Vatican-gesture-peace-immediately-attacked-vicious-seagull-crow.html#ixzz2rYL7CJH9

Russian-Chinese Naval Training Exercise Begins in Mediterranean

MOSCOW, January 25 (RIA Novosti) – A Russian-Chinese naval training exercise in the Mediterranean Sea began on Saturday involving the Russian nuclear-powered cruiser Pyotr Veliky and China’s Yancheng frigate, Russia’s Defense Ministry announced.

The exercise, which began with a gathering of the ships and accompanying speedboats, is being performed to reinforce co-maneuvering, air defense collaboration as well as naval helicopter landings on the different countries’ ships, the ministry’s press service said.

The exercise is focused on “raising the level of operational compatibility between Russian and Chinese military ships during joint actions in the eastern part of the Mediterranean Sea,” the ministry said.

Russian and Chinese military vessels began collaborating in the region on January 7 to ensure security for transports of Syrian chemical weapons.

Credit to RIA Novosti

Markets Are Falling, Which Means It's Time For The US To Bomb A Sovereign Nation

After the worst week for the market in over a year, the US knows the drill. Must. Distract. Population. And if a drunk-driving, prepubescent Miley Cyrus Canadian lookalike on a work visa won't do the trick, then by all means resort to ye olde faithful - bombing the feces out of some "independent" nation. In this case Somalia. CNN reports that earlier today, the US conducted a missile strike in Southern Somalia. The target: a "senior leader" affiliated with al Qaeda and Al-Shabaab, al Qaeda's affiliate in Somalia. Supposedly this is the Al Qaeda that the US isn't officially funding and supporting in Qatar's desperate and ongoing attempt to push its pipeline under Syria.

From CNN:

The U.S. military conducted an airstrike in southern Somalia on Sunday against a suspected militant leader, a U.S. military official told CNN.

The target was described by the official as a "senior leader" affiliated with al Qaeda and Al-Shabaab, al Qaeda's affiliate in Somalia.

The United States has not yet been able to determine whether the target was killed, the official said.

Last October, the elite U.S. Navy SEAL Team Six aborted a pre-dawn raid in southern Somalia to capture Al-Shabaab leader Ikrima after an intense firefight prevented them from reliably taking him alive, a senior U.S. official told CNN at the time.

In a second raid that same weekend, members of the U.S. Army Delta Force captured Abu Anas al Libi, an al Qaeda operative wanted for his alleged role in the deadly 1998 bombings of two U.S. embassies in Africa, during an operation in the Libyan capital of Tripoli.

The U.S. military official said Sunday's strike involved missiles. No U.S. troops were on the ground.

Al-Shabaab, designated a terrorist organization by the United States, has a relationship with al Qaeda that goes back several years. In 2012, the two groups effectively merged, said CNN national security analyst Peter Bergen.

And this is happening after the market has dropped a mere 4% from all time highs. Wait until we enter a bear market: tactical nukes will be going off left and right...

Credit to Zero Hedge

Israel Air Force jets flying over Beirut

Hezbollah's Al-Manar network reported Sunday morning that Israeli Air Force aircrafts are flying intensively in Lebanese airspace in the western Lebanon Valley, Beirut, Baalbek and Hermel.

Earlier Sunday it was reported by Voice of Lebanon radio station that IAF jets are scouring Lebanese airspace and hovering over the capital Beirut. Meanwhile, Lebanese El-Nashra news website reported that the IAF is operating in low altitude in the area of Baalbek in the Lebanon Valley.

The Lebanese army released a statement Sunday that two Israeli warplanes have entered Lebanese airspace and flew in the country for over an hour.

In the past two months, Lebanese media reported on numerous IAF operations within Lebanese airspace. However, none of the cases included a strike on Lebanese soil.

During the past weekend, there was much debate in the Lebanese media about an interview with senior Israeli officials in the Ramat David IAF base. Among others, the interview featured an Air Force unit commander who said: "We are closely following attempts to smuggle arms from Syria to Lebanon and attempting to prevent it from reaching Hezbollah."

LBC, the network that released the highly-debated interview, issued a statement on Saturday in which they claim they have fallen into an IDF trap, which used the network for its own purposes. "The error was made due to a misunderstanding, and not, God forbid, due to conspiring with the army that carried out the heinous acts in Lebanon, unrelated to its actions against the Palestinian people. They are still occupying Lebanese land and their Air Force is still violating Lebanese sovereignty," the statement read.

Credit to Ynetnews