Beltway Insider: U.S. Airstrikes Surge; ISIS Targets Three Nations; Hillary Testifies; Trump VP Close; Elie Wiesel

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President Obama, in the wake of the recent surge of U.S and coalition airstrikes throughout Islamic State strongholds in Yemen, Iran and Iraq, has announced the airstrikes have also resulted in civilian causality and the death of 116 non-combatants since 2009.

According to Gallup, President Obama's job approval, over the past week, increased by one percentage point to 51% of those polled who approve of his effectiveness as President and those who disapprove of his effectiveness as President increased three percentage points to 43%.  

Islamic State Target Three Nations

The Islamic State terrorist organization, ISIS/ISIL, moved against three nations this week in retaliation for the massive and deadliest U.S. led coalition assaults.

The airstrikes destroyed an ISIS convoy near Fallujah, Iraq, killing an estimated 250 ISIS forces and destroying at least 40 vehicles according to U.S. officials. If numbers are correct, the attacks could be the heaviest in the destroy and degrade campaign in recent history.

Utilizing fighters aligned to the Terror organization, ISIS/ISIL struck the Ataturk International Airport in Turkey, hitting Baghdad with twin car bombs igniting an inferno and slaughtering students, wealthy and socially elite in Bangladesh.

Turkey Airport Blast Signal Rise of Russian Born Islamic State Fighters

Turkish officials have confirmed the three suspected Islamic State suicide bombers who killed 42 travelers in a gun and bomb attack at Istanbul's Ataturk International airport this week were from Russia, Uzbekistan and Kyrgyzstan. While the Islamic State has not officially taken responsibility for the attack, investigators believe that ISIS/ISIL was behind the attack.

Akhmed Chatayev, a Russian extremist has been identified by Swiss and Turkish media as the ringleader in the triple bomb attack killed 42 and injured 239.

Bangladesh Killings First to Segregate Hostages for Slaughter

Three American college students were killed in the Bangladesh slaughter. Two of the students were from Emory University and the third a UC Berkeley Student who had accepted an internship in Dhaka.

The attack, which ISIS has claimed direct responsibility and local officials deny the Islamic State Terror Group is behind the massacre, targeted the elite of Bangladesh, bursting into the Holey Artisan Bakery, which is located in the diplomatic mission section of the capital city, a presumably safe zone.

The attack, that Bangladesh Officials claim was carried out by a local terror organization called Jumatel Mujahedeen Bangledesh, a domestic Sunni Muslim Terror group, has been described as "gruesome carnage."  

It is one of the first where ISIS or any terror group has directly targeted non-muslims and foreigners separating the hostages by nationality, each it has been reported had to surrender their passport or identification and recite verses for the Koran if there was any doubt.

Bangladesh military police used heavy equipment to punch holes in the walls to rescue the remaining hostages. The shocking scenes which media has only described as "bloody" indicated those killed died from knife wounds to the throat and also said the bodies were visibly hacked with the use of machetes or other sharp objects.

One American citizen, nine Italians, seven Japanese and one Indian were among the dead. Three of those killed were attending American universities including Tarishi Jain, 19, an Indian National, of UC Berkeley, who arrived for an internship at a bank.  The other two students Abinta Kabir and Faraaz Hossain studied at Atlanta's Emory University.

Rescued hostages explained they were separated and Muslims were spared and treated well, made to feel comfortable, and given food and water during the ten-hour ordeal.

Baghdad Car Bombings Create City Block Inferno; Killed 15 Children

Fifteen Children died Sunday in a twin car bomb attack that killed at least 91 people in the Iraqi capital, including a large-scale attack that killed 86 people, in a central shopping district, officials said.

The attack, which the Islamic State claimed responsibility, set off a city block inferno, killing shoppers in the adjoining shopping center,

Election 2016: Hillary Testifies; Trump Nears Vice-president Choice

Democratic President Candidate Hillary Clinton and Republican Presidential Candidate Donald J. Trump are moving closer to securing the official party endorsement as both parties will host its conventions later this month.

Moving closer to that date team Clinton have faced additional scrutiny and a three hour FBI questioning over the mishandling of email during her time as Secretary of State.

Bypassing protocol servers is the crux of the issue, which translates to essentially using her personal email instead of the secure channel provided at the State Department. The serious smoke screen that this misnomer has generated seems to be the only weapon in the republican arsenal.

Clinton, who has faced her share of allegations and scandals in her political career, has continued to answer the call and testify when requested. The idea that she has committed a campaign altering error is a reach even for the fantasy filled supporters of the republican candidate.

If email and an electronic messaging system were uncommon, the allegation may have warranted the man-hours and tax dollars spent on furthering a witch hunt.

Former President Bill Clinton who happened to meet Attorney General Loretta E. Lynch on the tarmac, setting off a political firestorm, Lynch announced on Friday that she will accept whatever recommendation prosecutors and the F.B.I. Director make about whether to bring charges related to Hillary Clinton's personal email server.

Trump Narrows his VP Choice

Donald J. Trump has narrowed his Vice Presidential candidate choice to two and is said he will announce his decisions before the Republican National Convention slated for July 18 through July 21, 2016 in Cleveland, Ohio.

According to sources House Speaker Newt Gingrich and New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie are among the finalists being considered to be Donald Trump's running mate. Odds makers are leaning toward New Jersey Governor Christie, a former Presidential hopeful, Christie has maintained a solid bipartisan base in New Jersey, a strong democratic state.

The GOP has moved quickly to address Democratic challenger Hillary Clinton current legal issue:

"The Obama Administration has failed to comply with records requests in a timely manner as required by law," RNC Chairman Reince Priebus said in a statement. "For too long the State Department has undermined the public and the media's legitimate right to records under the Freedom of Information Act, and it's time it complies with the law. If this administration claims to be the 'most transparent in history,' and Clinton the 'most transparent person in public life,' then they should prove it, release these records, and allow the American people to hold her accountable," as reported in Politico.

 

Also Beltway Insider: Obama, World, EU Reacts to Brexit; Brits Vote Leave; WV Floods; Whitey Bulger; Rio

Independence Day

America turns 240 years old this Fourth of July, and she may look a bit frayed and tattered around the edges, the stress of carrying the problems of world has taken our lady to the edge and back.

The annual Fourth of July Holiday has traditionally been cause for family picnics, bar-b-ques, and Fireworks. An annual day to honor the founding fathers of the United States and the military families who serve without hesitation and answer the call to defend our shores whenever needed.

Independence Day, setting aside the festivities, fun and food, in this season of heightened global violence, mass shootings, and the rise of those who desire to threatened our existence, to threaten our free society, Americans, those within the borders, and around the world should pause for a moment to reflect on a young society of thinkers who broke free from what they considered tyranny and bondage to an old system, fought through a sure death, survived the harshness of new lands, extreme weather, determined to become a new nation.

On July 4, 1776, a group of revolutionaries, rebel rousers, in actuality a committed group of five men, led by Thomas Jefferson penned the Declaration of Independence declaring these 13 colonies, a free nation.

"We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness."

Today as we celebrate Independence Day, give just one moment and think to those things ideals that separate each of us as a people, think to them and remember. We make up a great nation, a diverse people, each bringing to the table of plenty, ideas, dreams, hopes for a better tomorrow. We are a nation of dreamers of which can change the world.

We, as a people have made a dent as we have affirmed all men are created equal, we deny no one the unalienable right to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. Even as our definition of happiness is as diverse as each one of us, we accept and embrace the cultures that make us different, the freedom to a free life, liberty, and happiness as one's heart deems so.  

And for some fun Fourth of July Facts:

Americans spend more than 6.5 billion dollars in holiday food, second only to Thanksgiving. They'll spend more 800 million on money spent on fireworks and hard to believe the Fourth of July is the second busiest travel weekend as 43 million Americans will travel spending nearly 3 billion dollars.

Elie Wiesel, Holocaust Survivor, Activist, Humanitarian Dies

Elie Wiesel, Nobel Laureate, Holocaust Survivor, writer, author, scholar, professor and thinker, passed away this week at his home in Manhattan. He was 87.

"Elie Wiesel was one of the great moral voices of our time, and in many ways, the conscience of the world.  Tonight, Michelle and I join people across the United States, Israel and around the globe in mourning the loss and celebrating the life of a truly remarkable human being. I first came to know Elie through his account of the horror he endured during the Holocaust simply because he was Jewish," President Obama said.

"Elie taught me to understand the incomparable resilience of the human spirit, our capacity to overcome virtually anything. And because he had seen the depths of the darkness that we are capable of inflicting on one another, his belief in the fundamental goodness of humanity, his decision to live with purpose and kindness and respect toward all, was all the more inspiring. He once said: "Because I remember, I despair. Because I remember, I have the duty to reject despair." Throughout his life, Elie never stopped fighting for what he believed was right. He never gave in to despair," Vice-President Biden said.

"After we walked together among the barbed wire and guard towers of Buchenwald where he was held as a teenager and where his father perished, Elie spoke words I've never forgotten – "'Memory has become a sacred duty of all people of goodwill,'" Obama said. 

Elie Wiesel has been to hell. He has seen the extreme physical violence mankind can inflict on each other, he has witnessed the destruction of the soul, the determination by one people to destroy another by following blindly leadership that stood on barbarism, alienation, and hatred. And he carried on.

To those in position Elie Wiesel was a great man of honor and integrity, to those who survived the horrors of World War II Elie was the voice in the wilderness imploring the world to never forget. His survival in one of the most feared Concentration Camps, Auschwitz, the name alone is synonymous with death and then Buchenwald where is father was beaten and died is a miracle.

An ordinary day at Buchenwald, where emaciated bodies would be tossed in piles waiting for the truck to come and load them for mass burial. Elie Wiesel's father would be one of the nameless, his mother and sister also, for six million others, from Poland, Germany, Bulgaria, France, nations across Central European rolled over by Hitler's thunderous Nazi SS war machine, they too would be lost.

The lives, the deaths, the days became the foundation for Wiesel to stand with dignity facing the memories which should have incapacitated him, wearing his wounds with honor, lighting a torch that today, we as a world are better for.

This determination to keep the memories alive of the souls that cry out from the ashes and from the graves, and from the memories of those who are left still to bear the burden of survival has never died.

For more information on President Barack Obama: www.whitehouse.gov

Sources: Whitehouse.gov, Wikipedia.com,