Nuland in Azerbaijan: Another destabilization attempt planned on Russia's southern border?

What is Nuland up to in Azerbaijan?

The US' Assistant Secretary of State for European and Eurasian Affairs, Victoria Nuland, visited Baku on 16 February as part of her trip to the Caucasus, which also saw her paying stops in Georgia and Armenia. While Azerbaijan has had positive relations with the US since independence, they've lately been complicated by Washington's 'pro-democracy' rhetoric and subversive actions in the country. Nuland's visit, despite her warm words of friendship, must be look at with maximum suspicion, since it's not known what larger ulterior motives she represents on behalf of the US government.

A Bad Omen

Nuland is most infamously known for her "Fuck the EU!" comment that was uncovered during a secretly recorded conversation with the American Ambassador in Ukraine, Geoffrey Pyatt. The two were conspiring to build a new Ukrainian government even before democratically elected (but unpopular and corrupt) president Viktor Yanukovich was overthrown by the US-supported EuroMaidan coup. Nuland played a direct role in events, not only behind the scenes, but also on the streets, since she proudly handed out cookies and other foodstuffs to the 'protesters' that would violently seize power just over two months later. Her role in the Ukrainian events forever marks her as an agent for US-supported regime change in the former Soviet sphere, and her visit anywhere in that space should be seen as the bad omen that it is.

Like Husband, Like Wife

Normally an individual's personal life doesn't have any bearing on their professional one, but in the case of Nuland, it's the opposite because her husband is the leading neo-conservative thinker Robert Kagan. He and his ilk are known for their expertise in exploiting foreign geography to maximize US power, regardless of the regional cost. Also, he previously referred to Azerbaijan in 2006 as a "dictatorship" and said the US will "pay the price" for dealing with it when responding to a user-submitted Q&A session with the Financial Times:

"During the Cold War, both Europeans and Americans had to compromise with dictators around the world in order to weaken the Soviet Union and communism. What would be, in your view Mr Kagan, the new sort of compromises that the US government is willing to make to defeat terrorism?

Corneliu, Bucharest

Robert Kagan: Clearly we are making such kinds of compromises all over the place in the war on terrorism, although I must say I doubt they are proving very useful.

We are turning a mostly blind eye to the Mubarak dictatorship in Egypt, despite much rhetoric to the contrary, as well in Saudi Arabia. We have been forgiving of the dictatorships in Azerbaijan and Kazakhstan. Nor have we been very critical of the Putin dictatorship in Russia, no matter how many people he assassinates.

This is all largely in the service of the war on terror. During the Cold War I actually believed that we wrong to support so many dictators, for it often did not help but hurt in the struggle against communism, in addition to being a violation of the principles we were struggling to defend.

I am equally unpersuaded today that our support for these dictatorships will help us fight terrorism, and once again we pay the price of moral and ideological inconsistency."

Given the ideological context in which Nuland likely sees eye-to-eye on with her husband, plus her experience in instigating the Color Revolution in Ukraine, it is not likely that she came to Baku with positive intentions, or even with a positive image of the country in her mind. This is all the more so due to the recent scandal over Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty.

Foreign Agent, Domestic Punishment

The US-government-sponsored information agency was closed down at the end of December under accusations that it was operating as a foreign agent. While the US has harshly chided the Azeri government for this, at the end of the day, it remains the country's sovereign decision and right to handle suspected foreign agents as it sees fit. Azerbaijan's law is similar to Russia's, in that entities receiving foreign funds must register as foreign agents, and interestingly enough, both of these laws parallel the US' own 1938 Foreign Agents Registration Act (FARA).

So why does the US feel that it reserves the sole right to register foreign agents and entities, and if need be, identify and punish those that are acting in the country illegally, but Azerbaijan is deprived of this exercise of sovereignty? The reason is rather simple, actually - it's the US that is the most likely to use these foreign agents to destabilize and potentially overthrow governments (as in Ukraine most recently), whereas Azeri agents in America, should they even exist, are nothing more than an administrative nuisance incapable of inflicting any real harm on the authorities. This double standard is at the core of the US' relations with all countries in the world, not just Azerbaijan, but it's a telling example of the power and leverage Washington attempts to hold over Baku, which is seen most visibly by the blistering criticism leveled on the government after Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty's closing in compliance with the law.

Duplicitous Games

Even more concerning for Azerbaijan isn't the seditious game that the US and Nuland might be playing within the country, but the geopolitical one that they might be playing next door with Armenia. Although Washington says that it values Baku as a strategic and pragmatic partner, one needs to wonder to extent a prosperous, neutral Azerbaijan is more important to the US than a destabilized one that could be used as a weapon against Russia. To put everything into context, take a look at the threat that then-Secretary of State Hillary Clinton issued towards Russia and the Eurasian Union back in December 2012:

"There is a move to re-Sovietise the region, It's not going to be called that. It's going to be called a customs union, it will be called Eurasian Union and all of that, but let's make no mistake about it. We know what the goal is and we are trying to figure out effective ways to slow down or prevent it."

One year later, Ukraine, which could have been of immense value to the US and its geostrategy as a neutral, stable state, was in the middle of the US-supported EuroMaidan Color Revolution, showing that Washington will go to great and dramatic lengths to sacrifice its pragmatic interests for the sake of destabilizing Russia. So the question is, could the US also do the same in the Caucasus in order to simultaneously destabilize Russia from the southern flank while it's distracted in dealing with Ukraine?

In Armenia Against Azerbaijan, The US Always Wins

Armenia is arguably the weakest member of the Eurasian Union, and is thus the most prime for any external destabilization attempt. As the world has seen, the US will even go as far as instigating a war on Russia's borders (the Ukrainian Civil War) just to hamper its regional integration efforts in the west. Could it also try to instigate a new war in Nagorno-Karabakh, too, in order to facilitate this goal in the south? Azerbaijan doesn't know what matters Nuland discussed with Armenia behind closed doors, nor what convincing promises or irresistible threats she may have given Yerevan. The authorities can no longer be assured that Azerbaijan's enormous energy reserves guarantee it a safe place in the US' regional vision, especially considering the caustic language the US has used since the closing of Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty. If America is successful in instigating a continuation war between Armenia and Azerbaijan over Nagorno-Karabakh, neither of the two states would emerge as the strategic victor, since it's the US that would ultimately triumph because it would have succeeded in destabilizing Russia at the entire Caucasus' expense.

Walking A Tightrope

Given the fact that Azerbaijan can no longer trust the US to not conspire against its internal or external affairs, it is necessary for the country to tweak its foreign policy in order to best safeguard its interests. This means that although Baku cannot outright reject Washington or forget the two-decades-long history of fruitful cooperation with it (nor should it), it must pragmatically reorient its policies to adapt to multipolarity. By this, it is meant that Azerbaijan should look to diversify its partners and foreign policy dealings, namely, in the direction of Russia and Iran, the two neighborly countries that would support its leadership against any US-inspired plot against it.

Although there are certainly challenges existing in bilateral relations with Iran, this doesn't mean that they can't be overcome in the interests of preserving Azerbaijan's prosperity and protecting the country's overall population from any unwanted trans-Atlantic tinkering that could endanger it. Despite the fact that the US is most definitely interested in seeing Azeri energy power the EU, it is not yet known whether this objective of EU energy diversification is more important than the one of Russian destabilization. Under such circumstances, Azerbaijan must carefully walk a tightrope between the West (US/EU) on one hand, and the East (Russia/Iran) on the other, and if it is successful in delicately balancing between both worlds, then it can pivotally reap the resultant benefits thereof and propel its global prominence.

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Non-drug approaches to caring for dementia patients work better, carry far fewer risks

© Unknown

Doctors write millions of prescriptions a year for drugs to calm the behavior of people with Alzheimer's disease and other types of dementia. But non-drug approaches actually work better, and carry far fewer risks, experts conclude in a new report.

In fact, non-drug approaches should be the first choice for treating dementia patients' common symptoms such as irritability, agitation, depression, anxiety, sleep problems, aggression, apathy and delusions, say the researchers in a paper just published by the .

The best evidence among non-drug approaches is for those that focus on training caregivers -- whether they are spouses, adult children or staff in nursing homes and assisted living facilities -- to make behavioral and environmental interventions.

The researchers, from the University of Michigan Medical School and Johns Hopkins University, reviewed two decades' worth of research to reach their conclusions about drugs like antipsychotics and antidepressants, and non-drug approaches that help caregivers address behavioral issues in dementia patients.

They lay out their findings along with a framework that doctors and caregivers can use to make the most of what's already known. Called DICE for Describe, Investigate, Evaluate, and Create, the framework tailors approaches to each person with dementia, and as symptoms change.

"The evidence for non-pharmaceutical approaches to the behavior problems often seen in dementia is better than the evidence for antipsychotics, and far better than for other classes of medication," says first author Helen C. Kales, M.D., head of the U-M Program for Positive Aging at the University of Michigan Health System and investigator at the VA Center for Clinical Management Research. "The issue and the challenge is that our health care system has not incentivized training in alternatives to drug use, and there is little to no reimbursement for caregiver-based methods."

Coincidentally, a new U.S. Government Accountability Office report published the same day as the paper addresses the issue of overuse of antipsychotic medication for the behavior problems often seen in dementia. It finds that one-third of older adults with dementia who had long-term nursing home stays in 2012 were prescribed an antipsychotic medication -- and that about 14 percent of those outside nursing homes were prescribed an antipsychotic that same year.

The GAO calls on the federal government to work to reduce use of these drugs further than it's already doing, by addressing use in dementia patients outside nursing homes.

Kales, however, cautions that penalizing doctors for prescribing antipsychotic drugs to these patients could backfire, if caregiver-based non-drug approaches aren't encouraged.

She and her colleagues from Johns Hopkins, Laura N. Gitlin PhD and Constantine Lyketsos MD, note in their paper that "there needs to be a shift of resources from paying for psychoactive drugs and emergency room and hospital stays to adopting a more proactive approach."

But they also write, "drugs still have their place, especially for the management of acute situations where the safety of the person with dementia or family caregiver may be at risk." For instance, antidepressants make sense for dementia patients with severe depression, and antipsychotic drugs should be used when patients have psychosis or aggression that could lead them to harm themselves or others. But these uses should be closely monitored and ended as soon as possible.

The authors lay out five non-pharmacologic categories to start with based on their review of the medical evidence. These approaches have been shown to help reduce behavior issues: - Providing education for the caregiver - Enhancing effective communication between the caregiver and the person with dementia - Creating meaningful activities for the person with dementia - Simplifying tasks and establishing structured routines - Ensuring safety and simplifying and enhancing the environment around the patient, whether in the home or the nursing/assisted living setting

They also note that many "hidden" medical issues in dementia patients -- such as urinary tract infection and other infections, constipation, dehydration and pain -- can lead to behavioral issues, as can drug interactions. So physicians should look to assess and address these wherever possible.

Kales, Gitlin and Lyketsos are working with the U-M Center for Health Communications Research to launch a National Institute of Nursing Research-sponsored clinical trial this spring that will test the DICE approach through a computer based tool for caregivers called the WeCareAdvisor. The tool will help families identify tips and resources in a single computer interface to address behavioral symptoms. The tips are designed to prevent or mitigate possible triggers for common behavioral symptoms such as pacing, repetitive questioning, restlessness, or shadowing. .

For instance, de-cluttering the environment, using music or simple activities that help to engage a person with dementia , or using a calm voice instead of being confrontational, could help greatly to reduce behavioral symptoms, Kales says. And making sure that caregivers get breaks from their responsibilities and take care of themselves, especially in the home, can help them avoid burnout and taking their frustration out on patients.

"Behavior-based strategies may take longer than prescriptions," acknowledges Kales, a member of the U-M Institute for Healthcare Policy and Innovation. "But if you teach people the principles behind DICE, the approach becomes more natural and part of one's routine. It can be very empowering for caregivers or nursing home staff."

More research on both new drug options and the best ways to assess and address behavioral symptoms is needed, the authors conclude. But in the meantime, the evidence to date comes down in favor of non-drug approaches in most cases.

The components of the DICE approach are:

- D: Describe -- Asking the caregiver, and the person with dementia if possible, to describe the "who, what, when and where" of situations where problem behaviors occur and the physical and social context for them. Caregivers could take notes about the situations that led to behavior issues, to share with health professionals during visits.

- I: Investigate -- Having the health provider look into all the aspects of the person's health, dementia symptoms, current medications and sleep habits, that might be combining with physical, social and caregiver-related factors to produce the behavior.

- C: Create -- Working together, the patient's caregiver and health providers develop a plan to prevent and respond to behavioral issues in the person with dementia, including everything from enhancing the patient's activities and environment, to educating and supporting the caregiver.

- E: Evaluate -- Giving the provider responsibility for assessing how well the plan is being followed and how it's working, or what might need to be changed.

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New research validates chronic fatigue sufferers

© Jae S. Lee / The Tennessean

Esther Siebert, who has chronic fatigue syndrome, moved to Nashville from California a year ago. She still travels back to California for treatment, having no luck finding an internist locally who can help.

Esther Siebert, 67, has been living with a draining and debilitating disease for nearly 30 years, one that is only just recently being widely recognized as something real. Most commonly called chronic fatigue syndrome, it is a disease many doctors have been unable to diagnose, while many sufferers have been made to feel it was all in their head.

Siebert, who moved to Nashville from California a year ago, was lucky that her condition was recognized very early on by an understanding doctor. That isn't always the case.

"A lot of people are in the closet about it because it has been so ridiculed and maligned and neglected," Siebert says.

But a report released in February proposing a name change and diagnostic criteria, followed just a few weeks later with breaking research that scientists have discovered biomarkers for the disease, could change everything.

Commissioned by the Department of Health and Human Services, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the Food and Drug Administration and other health groups, the Institute of Medicine was tasked to examine the evidence base for myalgic encephalomyelitis/chronic fatigue syndrome (ME/CFS).

The result is a comprehensive review of all of the literature about the illness available, and in the report, Beyond Myalgic Encephalomyelitis/Chronic Fatigue Syndrome: Redefining an Illness, the IOM committee proposes new criteria that will help diagnosis patients and enhance understanding of what the symptoms are.

"When I was working on this project, and when I told people what I was doing, one of the most common responses I got was, 'Is this even real?' " says Dr. Ellen Wright Clayton of Vanderbilt University, who chaired the committee. "My answer is, 'Yeah, it is really real. People really have this. And it is a diagnosis that needs to be made.' "

According to the report, the disease is characterized by profound fatigue, cognitive dysfunction, sleep abnormalities, autonomic manifestations, pain, and other symptoms that are made worse by exertion of any sort. At least one-quarter of patients are bed- or house-bound at some point in their illness.

"The fatigue really gets in the way of your ability to do all the things you used to do, and it is often profound, severe and long-lasting, going on at least for six months in order to make the diagnosis," Clayton says. "But in many of these patients, it has been going on for years, even decades."

Name change adds legitimacy

The IOM committee has proposed a new name in the hopes of removing some of the stigma associated with ME/CFS and legitimizing the symptoms an estimated 836,000 to 2.5 million Americans are currently living with. The report suggests the name "chronic fatigue syndrome" trivializes the seriousness of the condition as well as the perception of doctors and loved ones who may have brushed it off as something in their head.

"We recommended changing the name for two reasons," Clayton says. "One, the stigma associated with chronic fatigue syndrome is enormous. And two, we think the best possible name is a name that is focused on the symptoms."

The recommendation is to change the name to systemic exertion intolerance disease (SEID), which Clayton says captures a central characteristic of the disease, the fact that exertion of any sort — physical, cognitive or emotional — can adversely affect patients in many organ systems and in many aspects of their lives.

And this isn't the kind of exertion like you would feel after a long day or rigorous hike. Siebert says it is almost like paralysis, and each movement she makes has to be mentally calculated ahead of time. She tells of a time when she was initially bedridden when she would only use her eyes to look at something instead of turning her head, and having to lay on the bathroom floor and try and regain some energy after becoming utterly drained from sitting up to use the restroom.

"The idea of exertion has to be brought down to our level," Siebert says. "I saw an article that talked about minor exertion as going to the grocery store. Going to the grocery store is not a minor exertion for us — being able to stand up while you brush your teeth? That is a victory."

New biomarkers found

The cause of ME/CFS remains unknown, although symptoms are most commonly attributed to being triggered by certain viral infections. Siebert was originally diagnosed with chronic Epstein-Barr Virus, which Clayton says is a major trigger in adolescence.

"Our knowledge of that in this area is really nascent," Clayton says.

Plus, there is no cure for what is affecting Siebert, and treatment, if people are lucky enough to find a doctor with an understanding of the illness, is only to help manage symptoms. That's why Clayton feels the most important part of the report is elaborating the diagnostic criteria.

"There is no question about it — this is the most comprehensive review of the literature that has ever been done, period, on this disorder," Clayton says. "This is something you don't want to have. But, it can be diagnosed and it should be diagnosed and it should be treated. Our major hope is that people will start making this diagnosis, taking these patients seriously, and taking care of them."

Last week's finding of a biological marker distinguishing differences in the immune systems of people with chronic fatigue syndrome and those of healthy people, as well as differences between people who have been sick for less than three years and those who have been sick longer, could eventually lead to a diagnostic test to identify the disease.

Siebert believes the report and research will do more than change the perception of the disease. She hopes it will lead to more funding and research to discover what causes it, how it develops and progresses, and finally develop an effective diagnostic marker and treatment.

"I'm so excited to see this study follow on the heels of the recent Institutes of Medicine report," says Siebert, the day the findings were released. "It's great to have yet another biomedical study confirm that this illness is a real, biological disease. And I hope this study is just the beginning of a massive effort to discover more clinical biomarkers as well as how to prevent, treat and cure this life-devastating disease."

Last year, the National Institute of Health dedicated $5 million to research for chronic fatigue syndrome. By comparison, Fibromyalgia got $11 million, asthma got $207 million, and Alzheimer's got $504 million.

"One of the reasons we don't understand the biology is because there hasn't been the money for the research," Clayton says. "The funding for this disorder is just shameful — $5 million a year for a disease that affects probably millions of people? That is just crazy."

Families struggle

Siebert considers herself one of the lucky ones, having maintained unwavering support from loved ones, both financial and emotional. In July she will be married for 34 years, only five of which she was healthy, and has three supportive grown children who have spent their lives watching their mother suffer.

"This is really a family disease," she says. "Part of the pain of it is how you are unable to take care of your loved ones, especially the children who need help. I was one of the fortunate ones in that my husband didn't leave me and I had income. There are so many patients out there, destitute, unable to even go out and get food. Having family and friends reject them because this illness was seen for so long — until now really — for being all in our heads."

Siebert has a bachelor's degree in journalism and a master's in communications from the University of Chicago. Before becoming sick, she worked in marketing and sold large computer systems to Fortune 500 companies. Yet, at times, she has been made to feel she didn't know her own body.

She spends her time mentally pacing out her days in order to get the simplest tasks done, like taking a shower or tidying up her kitchen. Rest doesn't help restore energy, so it could be days before crossing just those two things off her list.

"I did some advocacy writing yesterday and exhausted myself," she says. "I probably wrote four hours total, spread out throughout the day. Because of that overexertion — which was mainly sitting down at my computer — my brain would not allow me to go to sleep. I woke up and I am aching, my stomach is upset, and I can't function today at all."

And, for now, she still has to travel back to California for treatment, having no luck finding an internist locally who can help.

"We were living with doctors telling us we were crazy, family and friends or doctors telling you there is no such thing, and being sick with this could make you crazy," she says. "It is a gift I can sit up in a recliner a lot of the day without having to lay flat."

Key facts about ME/CFS

- Myalgic encephalomyelitis/chronic fatigue syndrome (ME/ CFS) affects 836,000 to 2.5 million Americans.

- An estimated 84 to 91 percent of people with ME/CFS have not yet been diagnosed.

- ME/CFS affects women more often than men.

- Most patients currently diagnosed with ME/CFS are Caucasian, but some studies suggest that ME/CFS is more common in minority groups.

- The average age of onset is 33, although ME/CFS has been reported in patients younger than age 10 and older than age 70.

Five main symptoms of ME/CFS

1. Reduction or impairment in ability to carry out normal daily activities, accompanied by profound fatigue.

2. Post-exertional malaise (worsening of symptoms after physical, cognitive or emotional effort).

3. Unrefreshing sleep.

4. Cognitive impairment.

5. Orthostatic intolerance (symptoms that worsen when a person stands upright and improve when the person lies back down).

Proposed diagnostic criteria

Diagnosis would require the following three symptoms:

- A substantial reduction or impairment in the ability to engage in pre-illness levels of occupational, educational, social or personal activities, that persists for more than six months and is accompanied by fatigue, which is often profound, is of new or definite onset (not lifelong), is not the result of ongoing excessive exertion, and is not substantially alleviated by rest

- Post exertional malaise

- Unrefreshing sleep

At least one of the two following would also be required:

- Cognitive impairment

- Orthostatic intolerance

SOURCE:

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Netanyahu's Iranophobic talk to U.S. Congress before election campaign

Iran’s Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Marziyeh Afkham.

On Tuesday, Iran's Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Marziyeh Afkham called the speech a deceitful show and part of the hardliners' political propaganda in Tel Aviv.

Netanyahu (pictured below during the address) addressed the Congress earlier in the day, calling on the United States not to negotiate "a very bad deal" with Iran over its nuclear energy program. He said, "We've been told for over a year that no deal is better than a bad deal. Well this is a bad deal, a very bad deal. We're better off without it."

Afkham said the address reflected the abject weakness and isolation of radical groups even among the supporters of the Israeli regime and their attempt to impose radical and illogical agendas upon the international politics.

She said "there is no doubt that the international opinion does not consider any value or standing for a child-killing regime" like Israel.

The Iranian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman further called the Israeli premier's recurrent fabrication of lies about the intentions of Iran's peaceful nuclear energy program very platitudinous and tedious.

"With the continuation of [nuclear] talks and Iran's serious will to diffuse the fabricated crisis [over its nuclear energy program], Iranophobic policy has met with serious problems and the founders of such propaganda and the planners of the fake crisis have started struggling."

Iran and the P5+1 group - Russia, China, France, Britain, the US and Germany - are negotiating to narrow their differences over the Islamic Republic's nuclear energy program ahead of a July 1 deadline.

Netanyahu said that it is not true that "the only alternative to this deal is war."

"The alternative to this deal is a much better deal. A better deal that doesn't leave Iran with a vast nuclear infrastructure and such a short breakout point," he added.

He said that the ongoing nuclear negotiations would provide Iran "with a short breakout time for a bomb."

"According to the deal not a single nuclear facility would be demolished," he said.

"So this deal won't change Iran for the better, it will only change the Middle East for the worst," he noted.

Netanyahu had been invited by US House of Representatives Speaker John Boehner hours after President Barack Obama threatened to veto any sanctions legislation against Iran during his State of the Union address on January 20.

Some 60 House Democrats boycotted the event. The Obama administration is both angry at Netanyahu's accepting the Republican invitation to address Congress two weeks before the Israeli election without consulting the White House and excessive Israel Lobby interference in American foreign policy.

Unimpressed Obama

US President Barack Obama said there was "nothing new" in the speech.

He told reporters that Netanyahu "did not offer any viable alternative."

"I am not focused in the politics of this, I am not focused on the theater," Obama said. "As far as I can tell, there was nothing new."

"We don't yet have a deal. But if we are successful, this will be the best deal possible with Iran," the US president said.

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Child Protective Services children found in human trafficking sex trade

Child Protective Services agencies are intended to take care of children with nowhere else to go, but corruption has infiltrated the government custodial system - putting kids at great risk.

National Safe Child founder Tammi Stefano takes a look at the problem and reveals cases of CPS children who ended up working in the growing human sex trafficking trade in this short clip from the full length Buzzsaw interview with Sean Stone.

[embedded content]

Tammi Stefano is the Executive Director of The National Safe Child Coalition (NSCC). Tammi has spent over two decades on front lines fighting for child safety. She understands the emotions of being victimized, having survived a kidnapping in her younger years. Determination was the driving force that prompted her to go undercover to catch a pedophile school teacher. Tammi's hands-on advocacy work has drawn comparisons to Erin Brockovich. She brings a background of legal research, training in child sexual abuse, certification as a Supervising Visitation Monitor and years working with parents on their Family Court cases. Having launched Capital Campaigns for Law Enforcement, Fire Organizations and Public Schools, Tammi is eager to launch a campaign to reform a broken system.

Watch the full interview and discussion of child abuse, child endangerment and the corruption in Child Protective Services below.

[embedded content]

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Just how Islamic is 'Islamic State'?

© www.commdiginews.com

Islamic State and the Qu'ran - mission or excuse?

IS not only misreads texts, most clerics say, it also ignores Quranic verses requiring mercy, preservation of life and protection of innocents.

Three British schoolgirls believed to have gone to Syria to become "jihadi" brides. Three young men charged in New York with plotting to join the Islamic State group and carry out attacks on American soil. A masked, knife-wielding militant from London who is the face of terror in videos showing Western hostages beheaded.

They are among tens of thousands of Muslims eager to pledge allegiance to the Islamic State group (Daesh). An estimated 20,000 have streamed into the territory in Iraq and Syria where the group has proclaimed what it calls a "caliphate" ruled by its often brutal version of Islamic law.

But how rooted in Islam is the ideology embraced by this group that has inspired so many to fight and die?

President Barack Obama has insisted the militants behind a brutal campaign of beheadings, kidnappings and enslavement are "not Islamic" and only use a veneer of Islam for their own ends. Obama's critics argue the extremists are intrinsically linked to Islam. Others insist their ideology has little connection to religion.

The group claims for itself the mantle of Islam's earliest years, purporting to recreate the conquests and rule of the Prophet Muhammad (PBUH) and his successors. But in reality its ideology is a virulent vision all its own, one that its adherents have created by plucking selections from centuries of traditions.

The vast majority of Muslim clerics say the group cherry picks what it wants from Islam's holy book, the Quran, and from accounts of Muhammad's actions and sayings, known as the Hadith. It then misinterprets many of these, while ignoring everything in the texts that contradicts those hand-picked selections, these experts say.

The group's claim to adhere to the prophecy and example of Muhammad (PBUH) helps explain its appeal among young Muslim radicals eager to join its ranks. Much like Nazi Germany evoked a Teutonic past to inspire its followers, Islamic State propaganda almost romantically depicts its holy warriors as re-establishing the caliphate, contending that ideal of Islamic rule can come only through blood and warfare.

It maintains its worst brutalities — beheading captives, taking women and girls as sex slaves and burning to death a captured Jordanian pilot — only prove its purity in following what it contends is the prophet's example, a claim that appalls the majority of the world's 1.6 billion Muslims.

Writings by the group's clerics and ideologues and its English-language online magazine, Dabiq, are full of citations from Quranic verses, the Hadith and centuries of interpreters, mostly hard-liners. But these are often taken far out of context, said Joas Wagemakers, an assistant professor of Islamic Studies at Radboud University Nijmegen in the Netherlands, who specializes in Islamic militant thought.

Muslim scholars throughout history have used texts in a "decontextualized way" to suit their purposes, Wagemakers said. But the Islamic State goes "further than any other scholars have done. They represent the extreme," he said. It would be a mistake to conclude the Islamic State group's extremism is the "true Islam" that emerges from the Quran and Hadith, he added.

Despite its claim to the contrary, the Islamic State group is largely political, borne out of the conflicts in Syria and Iraq, said Khaled Abou El Fadl, an Islamic law scholar at the University of California, Los Angeles. The group, he said, is trying to make God "a co-conspirator in a genocidal project."

Ahmed al-Dawoody, an assistant professor at the Institute for Islamic World Studies at Zayed University in Dubai, agreed. The phenomenon of reading religious sources out of context "has existed throughout the ages," he said. "We should not grant any legitimacy to those who violate Islam, then hijack it and speak on its behalf. This is not Islamic terror, this is terror committed by Muslims," he said.

IS not only misreads the texts it cites, most clerics say, it also ignores Quranic verses and a long body of clerical scholarship requiring mercy, preservation of life and protection of innocents, and setting out rules of war — all of which are binding under Islamic Shariah law.

Many mainstream clerics compare the group to the Khawarij, an early sect that was so notorious for "takfir," or declaring other Muslims heretics for even simple sins, that it was rejected by the faith. The Islamic State group denies that, but it draws heavily from 20th-century theories of "takfir" developed by hard-liners.

Part of the problem in countering the group's ideology is that moderate clerics have struggled to come up with a cohesive, modern interpretation, especially of the Quranic verses connected to Muhammad's wars with his enemies. Militants often point to the Quran's ninth sura, or chapter, which includes calls for Muslims to "fight polytheists wherever you find them" and to subdue Christians and Jews until they pay a tax. Moderate clerics counter that these verses are linked to specifics of the time and note other verses that say there is "no force in religion."

And while moderate clerics counter the Islamic State group's interpretation point-by-point, at times they accept the same tenets.

Sheikh Ahmed el-Tayeb — the grand imam of Egypt's Al-Azhar, one of Sunni Islam's most prestigious seats of learning — denounced the burning of the Jordanian pilot as a violation of Islam. But then he called for the perpetrators to be subjected to the same punishment that IS prescribes for those who "wage war on Islam" — crucifixion, death or the amputation of hands and legs.

This turns the debate into one over who has the authority to determine the "correct" interpretation of Islam's holy texts. Since many of the most prominent clerics in the Middle East are part of state-run institutions, militant supporters dismiss them as compromised and accommodating autocratic rulers.

The Islamic State group's segregation of the sexes, imposition of the veil on women, destruction of shrines it considers heretical, hatred of Shiites and condoning of punishments like lashings or worse are accepted by clerics in U.S.-allied Saudi Arabia, who follow the ultraconservative Wahhabi interpretation of Islam.

But IS goes further.

For example, most militaries in the era of Muhammad — the 7th century — beheaded enemies and enslaved populations they captured in war, including taking women as concubines. There are citations in the Hadith of Muhammad or his successors ordering beheadings, and verses in the Quran set out rules for dealing with slaves.

Pivoting off these, the Islamic State group contends that anyone who rejects beheadings or enslavement is not a real Muslim and has been corrupted by modern Western ideas.

One Islamic State cleric, Sheikh Hussein bin Mahmoud, wrote a vehement defense of beheadings after the killing of American journalist James Foley. "Those who pervert Islam are not those who cut off the heads of disbelievers and terrorize them," he wrote, "but those who want (Islam) to be like Mandela or Gandhi, with no killing, no fighting, no blood or striking necks." Islam, he wrote, is the religion "of battle, of cutting heads, of shedding blood."

To support beheadings, the group cites the Quran as calling on Muslims to "strike the necks" of their enemies. But other clerics counter the verse means Muslim fighters should swiftly kill enemies in the heat of battle, and is not a call to execute captives. Moreover, IS ignores the next part of the verse, which says Muslims should set prisoners of war free as an act of charity or for ransom.

The Islamic State group "appears to have adopted violent ideas first, then searched books of religious interpretation to find a cover for their actions," said Sheikh Hamadah Nassar, a cleric in the ultraconservative Salafi movement.

In June, the extremists declared a caliphate, or "khilafa" in Arabic, in the lands it controls in Iraq and Syria, with its leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi as the caliph — a declaration roundly ridiculed by Muslim clerics of all stripes. But here too, the group went further, saying that Islam requires the existence of a caliphate and anyone who refuses to recognize its declaration is not a true Muslim.

"The hopes of khilafa became an undeniable reality," the group proclaimed in its online magazine, Dabiq. Any Muslim who refuses IS authority will be "dealt with by the decisive law of Allah."

After that, the stream of IS recruits swelled by thousands.

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Venezuelan president Maduro revokes visa rights for "U.S. human rights abusers" Bush, Cheney, and others on his "anti-terrorism list"

The Venezuelan government has responded to increased pressure from Washington by revoking visa rights for former US politicians such as George W. Bush and Dick Cheney, described by President Nicolas Maduro as "terrorists against the peoples of the world" on Saturday.

"I have decided on a prohibition list for people who will not be permitted visas and who can never enter Venezuela, for a set of chief US politicians who have committed human rights violations. They have bombed the people of Iraq, the people of Syria, the people of Vietnam... It is an anti-terrorist list," declared the head of state to an impassioned crowd.

The statements were part of a rousing speech delivered by the president on Saturday to thousands of marchers who had taken to the streets of Caracas to reject White House interference in the South American country. The march was a direct response to a string of further US sanctions enacted against the Venezuelan government in early February and to what Maduro characterised as a "moment of increased aggression" from the Obama administration. The head of state went on to call for a "global rebellion against US imperialism".

"The US thinks it is the boss, the police of the world... Something happens somewhere, let's say in Asia, and a spokesperson for the US comes out saying that the US government thinks that such and such a government shouldn't do such and such a thing in Asia... Are we going to accept a global government? Enough of imperialism in the world!" stated an incensed Maduro.

During his speech, the head of state also announced a slew of new diplomatic measures against the US which include the implementation of visa requirements for all US citizens visiting Venezuela.

"They must pay what Venezuelans pay when they want to travel to the United States," said the president.

Maduro explained that the changes were designed to "protect" Venezuelans, after a number of US citizens were discovered to be taking part in acts of espionage by Venezuelan authorities.

One of the most recent detections includes the pilot of a US airplane who was stopped and questioned by authorities on the border last week. A number of US citizens were also detained last year for their participation in the armed barricades or Guarimbas which sought to bring down the government and led to the deaths of at least 43 Venezuelans.

Despite the latest measures, Maduro emphasised that Venezuela continued to value its relationship with US citizens.

"You can count on the fact that the people of Bolivar respect the people of the US, and recognise in you a brother peoples, these decisions are against the imperialist elite," he stated.

The new measures will see the number of staff at the US embassy in Caracas significantly reduced and US representatives obliged to inform Venezuelan authorities of any meetings that they intend to hold.

The diplomatic institution currently has over 100 employees, in comparison to just 17 who work at the Venezuelan embassy in Washington. Venezuelan Foreign Minister, Delcy Rodriguez, has explained that the US diplomatic mission will be obliged to reduce its staffing numbers to 17 over the next 2 weeks.

Tense Relations

Recently the US embassy in Caracas has become embroiled in a diplomatic altercation with the Maduro administration which has intensified since the discovery of a planned coup against the government in February. The Venezuelan head of state has accused the White House of conspiring against his government and charged embassy personnel with having advanced knowledge of the coup plot, which was allegedly being funded in US dollars from Miami.

Prior to the discovery of the coup, the US embassy was reported to have attempted to bribe senior military and government officials to partake in insurrectionist actions against the government. US Vice-president Joe Biden also made a series of statements accusing the Venezuelan government of repression following a meeting with the wife of jailed opposition leader, Liliana Tintori.

Current opinion polls suggest significant support amongst the population for government actions against the US. According to a February poll conducted by opposition aligned think tank, Hinerlaces, 92% of Venezuelans oppose any kind of foreign intervention while 62% think that the US should not be allowed to pass judgement on the country's internal affairs.

In 2014, the US government issued 103 statements against Venezuela and another 65 since the start of the year. Just a few weeks ago, the Obama administration also approved increased funding for Venezuelan opposition groups and Non-Governmental Organisations.

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